144 



JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Touch and taste are intimately connected, and both taste and 

 smell together form what we call flavour, aroma, or 

 bouquet. 



So also we like to connect seeing and hearing at the opera or 

 theatre or concert, nay, even at lectures, where we call in the aid 

 of lantern slides or diagrams when actual things themselves are 

 not available. Some day we shall be able to show you different 

 odours on the screen, and I am sorry that I cannot so show you 

 some of them to-day. 



Sight, taste, touch, smell, and hearing have all been gratified 

 at once from the earliest civilised times in all countries. 



Things " pleasant to the eye and good for food " have always 

 been an attraction since the days of Eden, and are sure of a 

 ready sale in our markets of to-day. But, after all, the primitive 

 senses, noble as they are, are not everything. Even our very 

 highest sensual education is merely instinct, and instinct is a 

 blind and unreasoning expression of animal feeling : " Man 

 cannot live by bread alone " ; " Let him who hath two loaves of 

 bread sell one and buy flowers of the Narcissus, for bread is food 

 for the body, but Narcissus is food for the soul." Feed a man as 

 you will ; clothe him in fine linen, purple, and gold ; give him 

 wine and music and all other luxuries, and he will ask for " the 

 feast of reason and the flow of soul." He will ask you for 

 brotherly sympathy and human fellowship, for " a temple not 

 made with hands." 



Flower Odours Positive ; Leap Odours Negative. 



Flower perfumes, as we have said, are positive, being mostly 

 given off whether we like it or not, and some people are so 

 extremely sensitive to perfumes that those of Hyacinths, Nar- 

 cissus, some Lilies (especially L. auratum), and even Roses 

 prove disagreeable, and at times actually injurious. We are told 

 that " one dog's meat is another dog's poison," and floral odours 

 that delight some people prove extremely disagreeable to others ; 

 and though "aromatic pain " of this kind may not actually kill 

 folks it is none the less a nuisance for the time it must be 

 endured. To all those who suffer from strong floral perfumes I 

 can strongly recommend the more negative qualities of fragrant 

 leaves. 



