THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM. 491 



These different phenomena haA'e been particularly ob- 

 served in persons keeping nosegays near them during the 

 night. The flowers exhale, as we know, carbonic acid; 

 but in the cases we speak of the accidents ought not to 

 be ascribed to lethal vapours, but to the odorous exhala- 

 tions from the flowers, which operate, as Orfila says, like 

 certain poisons, for they act fatally upon some individuals 

 and do not affect others in the least. 



In 1779 a woman died in London during the night from 

 having kept a large bouquet of irises in her room. Triller 

 saw a young girl perish in the same way from the eflTects 

 of a bouquet of violets ; and it has been stated that work- 

 men, who have imprudently fallen asleep upon bales of 

 saffron, have died in consequence. 



The scent of roses, so much sought for everywhere, 

 causes repugnance in some persons and inconveniences 

 others. Catherine of Medici could not endure it, and her 

 aversion to these flowers was so great that it was enough 

 for her to see the painting of one to be seized with some 

 degree of nausea. The Chevalier de Guise was still more 

 easily affected, for he fainted at the sight of a bunch of 

 roses. 



Some cases are even told in which the smell of these 

 flowers sufficed to produce instant death, but they are 

 perhaps apocryphal.^ 



^ The death of oue of the daughters of Nicholas I., Count of Salins (in tlie 

 department of Jura), and that of a Bishop of Poland, are attributed to the emana- 

 tions from rosea. But these facts, related by the historian C'loiner, aie probably 

 inexact. 



