EFFECTS OF FLOWER SCENTS.

Evening Post, Volume LXXIX, Issue 113, 14 May 1910, Page 13

EFFECTS OF FLOWER SCENTS.

There is no evidence to support the theory put forward that the scent of narcissus may cause influenza. But many strange cases are on record regarding the effects of the smell of flowers. "A foreign officer," said a medical man to a London journalist on 13th March, "one night went -to sleep with a number of bunches of oleander — an evergreen shrub with red and white flowers — in his bedroom. In the morning he was found dead. The pungent smell of the oleander had asphyxiated him. "Less serious is the case of a doctor ■«ho, after sitting for some time in a room where there were several bowls of jasmine, became exceedingly giddy. He removed the flowers, whereupon lie was himself again at once. "A number of oranges in a room has been known to make a man unconscious. I know, also, of the case of a man who, going to sleep in a storeroom fulJ of apricots, was discovered next day in an i unconscious, condition, and lay for some time in peril of his life."

Thn lodger's pet aversion was cats, and he cherished a special grudge against n feline which sometimes shared his meals without, his consent. Just as ho was p.eparing for bed ho caught, sight of a suspicious hump under the counterpane. "The brute!" he mutteied, and his eyes glared murder as he reached for one of the ten-pound dumbbells with which lie was wont to toy each morning Stealthily he approached the bod Then, thud ! And one of tho items on hi 6 next week's bill was: ''To ono hot-Hater bottle, 5e."