45 



stance called valerianic acid, forms what is known as apple oil. 

 Wine ether and butyric acid make pine apple-oil. And, by com- 

 bining certain hydro-carbons first with oxygen, and then with some 

 of the animal or vegetable acids, we get a series of fruit odours and 

 flavours embracing the most delicate in nature. Take, again, some 

 of these very hydro-carbons, and combine them with ammonia, 

 and we get disgusting smells. One of these combinations, which 

 was made in the chemist's laboratory, has been found to be the 

 principle which gives the smell to a very strong smelling plant — 

 the stinking goosefoot — and also to stale salt fish. When this 

 goosefoot is distilled along with a solution of soda it yields this 

 substance, smelling like a mixture of stale stock-fish, boiled crabs, 

 herring brine, and unsound Findon haddy. Another substance, 

 identical in composition with this, has been found in the common 

 hawthorn and in the pear tree. It is curious to find the same 

 principle in the live and growing plant and in the dead and decay- 

 ing fish. Combine these hydro-carbons again with sulphur, and 

 we get the most intolerable of smells. If sulphur is substituted for 

 the oxygen in the first essences, the smell becomes absolutely un- 

 bearable. But even these can be excelled. When arsenic is sub- 

 stituted for sulphur in some of these combinations, we get a substance 

 called kakodyle — a most intolerable and deadly odour. Even this 

 latter has been excelled both in its intensity and in its death-deal- 

 ing powers. Many such substances were offered to the war de- 

 partment during the Russian war. There is one thing noteworthy 

 about some of these sulphur combinations. There is one of the 

 hydro-carbons which, when combined with sulphur, gives the odour 

 of garlic. Now, this substance has been found in all the plants 

 having this smell — in the onion, leek, in assafcetida, in garlic, and 

 in many other plants belonging to different natural orders. This 

 bad odour notwithstanding, these substances have been used both 

 in ancient and modern times all over the world as ingredients of 

 the most savoury dishes. The same instinct which drove men 

 living in regions widely separated to use tea, and coffee, and matte 

 as a beverage — all containing the same chemical ingredient — seems 

 to have forced men to use these garlic-smelling plants. It is pro- 



