BREEDING FOR PERFUME 
So with flowers; it is entirely feasible to 
breed a flower so that it shall have a given 
amount of volatile oil, selecting through 
generations those flowers which show increas- 
ing amounts of this substance, — determined 
by analysis,—and by rigid selection and ex- 
clusion developing those, as,in the corn, 
which have in their composition the requi- 
site amount of oil for conserving the per- 
fume. It is not always the flower with the 
most powerful fragrance that is convertible 
into the largest amount of perfume, but 
the valuable one is that which carries the 
perfume most completely in its oil. The 
odor depends, too, quite frequently upon the 
quality rather than the quantity of this oil. 
Given, then, a flower needing more fra- 
grance, one having no odor but in which it 
is desirable that an odor shall be placed, 
one with a disagreeable odor needing change, 
or one calling for a certain per cent of 
essential oil to mask its fragrance and aid 
in converting it into perfume, — they are all 
to be made over to order. 
In the mountains of Bulgaria, where the 
attar of roses reaches its height of produc- 
187 
