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PTJETHEE NOTES ON SWEETLY-SMELLING FLOWEES. 



lAVINGr read a very interesting paper by Mr. Eobinson 

 on this subject, 1 thought I might interest your readers 

 by offering a few notes on some favourites of my own. 

 Every one knows of a few favourite flowers that are very 

 sweet-scented, and that are grown as much for their 

 odour as their beauty. Tastes differ, and you will observe that some 

 persons never apply their noses to a flower or leaf of any kind, and I 

 confess I am of the number. Though enjoying the odour of flowers 

 with a real zest, I have such a passion for colour, that, unless the 

 fragrance of a flower is sufliciently powerful to arrest my attention, 

 it is rarely I think to ascertain if it is odorous or not. On the other 

 hand, many persons put the olfactory nerves in action at first sight 

 of a flower, and will forgive any and every fault as to form and colour 

 if it be bat sweet-scented. There are, indeed, very few flowers but emit 

 an agreeable odour, though it may be faint. We can detect a flowery 

 freshness in the air of our orchard-house now early of a morning from 

 the blooms of pears and peaches, and we can see in the centre of the 

 pear blooms thick drops of honey glittering like amber for the at- 

 traction of the bees. Everybody knows the fragrance of mignonette, 

 heliotrope, Aloysia citriodora (commonly called scented verbena), 

 sweet pea, lilac, hawthorn, lime, lavender, sweetbriar, southernwood, 

 violets, hyacinths, honeysuckle, white jasmine, clematis, cytisus, musk, 

 meadowsweet, cloves, stocks, wallflowers, and (to pass by a thousand 

 others) the queen of flowers — most beautiful of ail in colour, form, 

 foliage, and fragrance — the rose. But there are a few exquisitely 

 scented plants which very few know of, and at this time of year it is 

 as well to call attention to them for the purpose of adding to the 

 garden pleasures of those who literally "follow their nose" in making 

 selections of plants for culture. 



One of our favourite shrubs, which we grow in a wet peat bed, is 

 Myrica gale, the sweet gale (or box myrtle), a native of Britain, and 

 quite hardy. This is more deliciously scented than any myrtle, and 

 the best of all vegetable products to place in drawers with clothing, 

 to render them delightfully perfumed. When nearing this plant 

 during a garden ramble, the nose is informed of its proximity to a 

 source of a most refreshing and agreeable spicy odour, and a twig of 

 the plant broken off' at any time, winter or summer, will retain its 

 fragrance for months, if kept enclosed in a book or between folds of 

 linen. Hung up anywhere in a room, it will diffuse its sweet odour 

 for weeks together in the atmosphere; and, as the plants grow freely, 

 it only needs to be cut at judiciously, and it will supply twigs all the 

 year round for an^^ purpose for which its i'ragrauce may be required. 

 This plant is plentiful on the dreary wastes of Dartmoor, where the 

 red pebbly heath soil seems to suit it admirably. It will grow 

 anywhere with hardy heaths and rhododendrons, and when bearing 

 catkins is an interesting though not a beautiful object. When the 

 sweet gale is boiled, a wax rises to the surface of the water, which, 



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