INTRODUCTION. Xvil 
varieties of Lotus. (The words Lotus or Water-Lily, the Latin 
lotus ‘‘ washed,” and the English lotion “awash,” are expressed in 
India by the word /ota, which is there applied to a globular brass 
bowl, sometimes melon-shaped, with a long narrow neck, universally 
used in ceremonial and other ablutions.) 
The flowers of the well-known yellow Water-Lily, Nuphar lutea, 
a plant which is common in most parts of Britain, and frequently 
grown in ornamental waters, have a curious alcoholic odour, hence 
the name “ Brandy-bottle ” which is applied in some counties to 
this plant; the flowers are used by the Turks in the preparation of 
cooling drinks. The same peculiar odour of brandy is also found 
in the yellow catkins of the Saliz caprea, the “ Goat Willow.” 
The Hippocrepis comosa, a sort of “ Horse-shoe Vetch,” 
common on chalky soils, recalls the smell of cheese, an odour 
which is also observable in the blossoms of Genista Scoparia, a 
thorny shrub, native of Spain ; to some persons the odour of this 
flower is more like that of the fruit of the cocoa-nut. The leaves 
of the Philadelphus Coronarius have an odour and flavour precisely 
resembling cucumbers. 
Some odours are developed by desiccation, as Deer’s-tongue 
leaves, Hedychium root, and Iris root; and some by partial fer- 
mentation, as Vanilla pods, Patchouli, tobacco, and tea leaves. 
The leaves of Scopolia luridus (Dunal), a solonaceous plant of 
Nepaul and the Himalaya, emit a tobacco-like odour. 
The Hedyosmum nutans (Swartz), called the “Tobacco bush” 
in Jamaica, is a common plant on the hills about Port Royal and 
on the Blue Mountains at an elevation of 5000 to 6000 feet above 
the sea. The aromatic oil distilled from it certainly has an odour 
somewhat like that of cake “ honey-dew ” tobacco. The Critonea 
Dalea, D.C., is another Jamaica plant locally called the “ Cigar 
bush”’* or “ Cigar-maker’s vanilla.’ Its odour recalls that of new- 
made hay and especially that of the Liatris odoratissima (“ Deer’s- 
tongue”), an herbaceous plant abundant in North Carolina and 
Florida, whose leaves are also used by tobacco-manufacturers for 
aromatising tobacco. 
* Samples of Tobacco-bush oil and Cigar-bush oil were in the Colonial 
Exhibition. They have been recommended for perfuming toilet-soaps. 
b 
