NIGHT SCENTED PLANTS. 121 



being "like water poured on a duck's back." More- 

 over if we turn to the vegetable creation, we find that 

 under certain circumstances flowers and plants have like- 

 wise the power of retaining their scent, notably so in the 

 case of certain classes of plants, which are scented only 

 at night, but are odourless by day. The German traveller 

 Dr. Georg Schweinfurth, for instance, records with great 

 admiration the delicious aroma emitted by the desert 

 herbage while he was encamped and lay stretched upon 

 the ground by night in the sterile mountain region 

 between Suakim and Sinkat, while on his way to Berber. 

 Some of the most deliciously scented of these plants, 

 it seems were " little obscure mountain weeds amongst 

 which a 'pulicaria' plays an essential part." * Now, 

 while the sun is shining with tremendous power and 

 in fiery glory by day, very few of these desert plants 

 emit a very conspicuous aroma, but it is often very 

 noticeable by night sometimes also it is brought out 

 by wetting them. The Kus-Kus grass of India affords 

 a good example of this latter phenomenon. 



These circumstances however all tend to show, that 

 whether in bird, beast, or plant, the natural aroma which 

 is under ordinary circumstances exhaled by them is 

 subject to certain mysterious laws and modifica- 

 tions, of which at present we have but little know- 

 ledge. 



What we do know however, as sportsmen, is that 

 the fear of man, which appears to be pretty well universal 

 among the brute creation seems to be even more readily 

 excited by the sense of smell than by that of vision. 

 Many animals which will stand, as we have said before, 



* The Heart of Africa, by Dr. Georg Schweinfurth, German Botanist, 

 2nd Edit., 1874, Vol. i, page 20. 



