96 SECRETS OF ANIMAL LIFE 
odoriferous substances of plants are justified by 
their protective value, and others by their attractive 
value, while of many it must be simply admitted 
that their significance is internal and chemical, 
sometimes perhaps no more than that of the waste- 
products in a manufactory, and that their quality 
of olfactory stimulation has not been turned to any 
account. They are the ashes of the living fires, 
yet as we sniff the perfumed air in which quintillions 
of aromatic particles are hurrying past us, here from 
gorse and hawthorn, there from woodruff and sweet 
vernal grass, we cannot but ask whether this multi- 
tudinous aerial excretion may not have some 
physiological significance in the economy of 
creatures which are, as compared with animals, con- 
spicuously without arrangements for getting rid of 
their waste products, May not this volatilization of 
the ethereal oils help to keep the floral fire from 
being smothered in its own ashes? 
In this medley of odors, whiffs of brier rose and 
lady’s bedstraw, honeyed clover and soporific 
myrrh, the idea that rings in the mind like a bell 
is Individuality, Specificity, Uniqueness. All flesh 
is not the same flesh, and each flower’s fragrance 
is its own and no other’s. Some five hundred 
different aromatic compounds have been distin- 
guished, such as the aminoid in hawthorn, the 
benzoloids in mignonette and violets, the paraffin- 
oids in geranium and rose, the turpenoids in orange 
and lavender, each group including many specifi- 
cally different kinds, indices of the individuality 
