MARKET VALUE OF SWEET FOLIAGE 13 
MARKET VALUE OF SWEET FOLIAGE 
‘©The market is the best garden.”’— George Herbert in “‘ Jaculum Pru- 
dentum,”’ 
To come to trade matters, I believe a good business 
could be done in hardy, fragrant, and durable foliage as 
opposed to flowers. I am told that there is always a 
good demand for all kinds of sweet pot herbs in our 
great city markets, either fresh or as dried; and I can 
well believe the statement that the supply of good 
foliage or greenery falls short of the demand, although 
there are generally plenty of flowers. “The cook, the 
doctor and druggist, and the makers of wines, liqueurs, 
and cordials, and floral decorators owe much, and might 
owe much more, to fragrant foliage and to agreeably 
flavoured herbs. In Elizabeth’s days the “‘ herb woman ” 
was a necessary addition to the servants of the fine old 
country houses, and there is some reminiscence of her 
and her duties lingering around the English Court to- 
day. 
I believe all pleasant odours are harmless, and very 
often they are actually beneficial, On the other hand, 
whilst many disagreeable odours may be harmless, but 
few of them do us any good, and some of them carry 
the germs of dire disease, and often prove a scourge to 
the human race. Beau Brummell used to insist that no 
man of fashion in his day should use perfumes, but that 
he should send his linen to be washed and dried on 
Hampstead Heath. 
‘< For of all things, there is none so sweet as sweet air 
—one great flower it is drawn round about, over and 
enclosing like Aphrodite’s arms: as if the dome of the 
sky were a bell flower dropping down over us, and the 
magic essence of it filling all the room of the earth. 
Sweetest of all things is wild-flower air.” So we see 
that even Jefferies had been anticipated, as to the 
