ODORS AXD LIFE. 155 



ambrosial fragrance, as Virgil tells us, in speaking of Venus ; ' and 

 Moschus, describing Jupiter transformed to a bull. The use of per- 

 fumes in religious ceremonies had for its purpose the excitement of a 

 sort of intoxication in the priests and priestesses, and also to disguise 

 the smell of blood and of decaying matters, the offal of the sacrifices. 

 The Christian religion borrowed from paganism the use of perfumes 

 in the rites of worship. There was even a period at which the Church 

 of Rome owned estates in the East devoted exclusively to plantations 

 of trees yielding balsamic resins. 



Besides these uses, odors were, in old times, still oftener employed 

 in private life. Nothing surprises us more, in reading the ancient au- 

 thors, than their relations on this subject. Among the Jews, the use 

 of perfumes was restrained within proper limits, by the regulations of 

 the Mosaic law, which consecrated them to worship. But, with the 

 Greeks, it reached an extraordinary height and refinement. They 

 kept their robes in perfumed chests. They burned aromatic sub- 

 stances during their banquets ; they scented their wines ; they cov- 

 ered their heads with fragrant essences at their festivals. At Athens, 

 the perfumers had shops which were places for public resort. Apol- 

 lonius, a scholar of Theophilus, left a treatise on perfumes .whi'ch proves 

 that, even as regards the extraction of essences, the Greeks had attained 

 astonishing perfection. Neither Solon's laws nor Socrates's rebukes 

 could check the progress of that passion. The Romans inherited it 

 from Greece, and enlarged the stock of Eastern perfumes by those of 

 Italy and Gaul. They used them profusely to give fragrance to their 

 baths, their rooms, their beds, and their drinks. They poured them 

 on the heads of guests. The awning shielding the amphitheatre was 

 saturated with scented water, which dripped, like a fragrant rain, on 

 the spectators' heads. The very Roman eagles were anointed with 

 the richest perfumes before battle. At the funeral of his wife Pop- 

 prea, Nero burned on the pyre more incense than Arabia yielded in 

 a whole year. It is related, too, that Plancius Plancus, proscribed by 

 the triumvirs, was betrayed by the perfumes he had used, and thus 

 discovered to the soldiers sent to pursue him. Besides the odors ex- 

 tracted from mint, marjoram, and the violet, which were the most 

 common, the ancients made much use of the roses of Paestum, and 

 various aromatic substances, such as spikenard, megalium, cinnamon, 

 opobalsamum, etc. 



It is singular to notice that the use of perfumes, brought to Rome 

 with Grecian manners, was in its turn conveyed to France and North- 

 ern Europe with Latin manners, and chiefly by the Romish religion. 

 It is from religious rites, indeed, that it passed into ceremonies of 

 state, and thence into private life. Among the presents sent by 



1 " Then, as the goddess turned, a rosy glow 



Flushed all her neck, and from her head the locks 

 Ambrosial breathed celestial fragrance round." 



