thought it no loss, but really a new and valuable pleasure, to divert my
path down the lane for several days that I might enjoy more fully this
new odour, and make a clear acquaintance with something fine upon the
earth I had not known before.



CHAPTER II


OF GOOD AND EVIL ODOURS

Of all times of the day for good odours I think the early morning the
very best, although the evening just after sunset, if the air falls
still and cool, is often as good. Certain qualities or states of the
atmosphere seem to favour the distillation of good odours and I have
known times even at midday when the earth was very wonderful to smell.
There is a curious, fainting fragrance that comes only with sunshine and
still heat. Not long ago I was cutting away a thicket of wild spiraea
which was crowding in upon the cultivated land. It was a hot day and
the leaves wilted quickly, giving off such a penetrating, fainting
fragrance that I let the branches lie where they fell the afternoon
through and came often back to smell of them, for it was a fine thing
thus to discover an odour wholly new to me.

I like also the first wild, sweet smell of new-cut meadow grass, not the
familiar odour of new-mown hay, which comes a little later, and is
worthy of its good report, but the brief, despairing odour of grass just
cut down, its juices freshly exposed to the sun. One, as it richly in
the fields at the mowing. I like also the midday smell of peach leaves