16 THE DELIGHTS OF GARDENS 



in the air (where it comes and goes like the warb- 

 ling of music) than in the hand, therefore nothing 

 is more fit for that delight than to know what be 

 the flowers and plants that do best perfume the air. 

 Roses, damask and red, are fast flowers of their 

 smells, so that you may walk by a whole row of 

 them and find nothing of their sweetness, yea, 

 though it be in a morning's dew. . . . That which 

 above all others yields the sweetest smell in the air 

 is the violet, especially the white double violet which 

 comes twice a year about the middle of April 

 and about Bartholomew-tide. Next to that is the 

 musk-rose, then the strawberry leaves dying, which 

 yield a most excellent cordial smell ; then the 

 flower of the vines, it is a little dust, like the dust 

 of a bent, which grows upon the cluster in the first 

 coming forth ; then sweet briar, then wallflowers, 

 which are very delightful to be set under a parlour 

 or lower chamber window ; then pinks and gilli- 

 flower ; then the flowers of the lime-tree, then the 

 honeysuckles, so they be somewhat afar off; of bean 

 flowers I speak not, because they are field flowers. 

 But those which perfume the air most delightfully, 

 not passed by as the rest, but being trodden upon 

 and crushed, are three, that is : burnet, wild thyme, 

 and water mints. Therefore you are to set whole 

 alleys of them to have the pleasure when you walk 

 or tread. 



FRANCIS BACON (LORD VERULAM). 



