strode stolidly on in company with new-mown hay, cologne, and sweet
peas. Liszt was interpreted as ylang-ylang, myrrh, and maréchale;
Richard Strauss, by wistaria, oil of cloves, chypre, poppy, and
crab-apple.

Suddenly there developed a terrific orchestration of chromatic odours:
ambrosia, cassia, orange, peach-blossoms, and musk of Tonkin, magnolia,
eglantine, hortensia, lilac, saffron, begonia, peau d'Espagne, acacia,
carnation, liban, fleur de Takeoka, cypress, oil of almonds, benzoin,
jacinth, rue, shrub, olea, clematis, the hediosma of Jamaica, olive,
vanilla, cinnamon, petunia, lotus, frankincense, sorrel, neroli from
Japan, jonquil, verbena, spikenard, thyme, hyssop, and decaying orchids.
This quintessential medley was as the sonorous blasts of Berlioz,
repugnant and exquisite; it swayed the soul of Baldur as the wind sways
the flame. There were odours like wingèd dreams; odours as the plucked
sounds of celestial harps; odours mystic and evil, corrupt and opulent;
odours recalling the sweet, dense smell of chloroform; odours evil,
angelic, and anonymous. They painted--painted by Satan!--upon his
cerebellum more than music--music that merged into picture; and he was
again in the glade of the Druids. The huge scent-symphony dissolved in a
shower of black roses which covered the ground ankle-deep. An antique
temple of exotic architecture had thrown open its bronze doors, and out
there surged and rustled a throng of Bacchanalian beings who sported and
shouted around a terminal god, which, with smiling, ironic lips,
accepted their delirious homage. White nymphs and brown displayed in
choric rhythms the dance of the Seven Deadly Sins, and their goat-hoofed
mates gave vertiginous pursuit. At first the pagan gayety of the scene
fired the fancy of the solitary spectator; but soon his nerves,
disordered by the rout and fatigued by the spoor of so many odours,
warned him that something disquieting was at hand. He felt a nameless