PERFUMED PLANTS. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 



"Redolent mumeque crocique." 



THE " Little Corsican " used to say that if landed 

 blindfold on his native island he would be able to 

 recognise it by the perfume of the flowers. I think 

 that one might say the same thing of the Riviera. 

 There is among the Olive groves an aromatic fra- 

 grance which is so familiar to us that we should know 

 it again if we were to breathe it after whatever lapse 

 of time. How much more then if we have inhaled 

 this balmy air in early life? There is something 

 pathetic in the grim soldier, who has been the terror 

 of Europe, familiar with the roar of battle and the 

 dread sounds of war, thinking with fond regret of the 

 sweet-scented hill-sides of his early home. There 

 comes a time to each of us when we look back on 

 days which are hardly any longer to be called a 

 memory, but rather a faint dying perfume of the 

 past. 



The disciples of Empedocles were wont to grow 

 aromatic herbs as a preventive of disease. Here 

 we need not to cultivate them, for Nature has 

 assumed the task. 



Let us inquire from what plants these " odours 

 of Edom " are exhaled. Firstly, there is that little 



