A review of the pleasures and practices of the table at various periods and among various peoples is an alluring but here impracticable undertaking. Let it suffice to cite one example from the ancients, that most celebrated of all descriptions of revelry at the board, the cœna Trimalchionis of Petronius, which W. A. Becker has made use of in his Gallus. The following will serve as a characteristic ethnological instance of the enjoyment of flavours, which are, to put it mildly, decidedly equivocal. In Java the durian tree bears green prickly fruit, about the size of cocoanuts and with a flavour which, according to Wallace, furnishes a new sensation well worth journeying to the Orient for. The smell of it is something frightful—a cross between musk and garlic, with suggestions of carrion and “overripe” cheese. The taste is aromatic, satisfying, and nutty, like a combination of cream cheese, onion sauce, and burnt sherry. This fruit is rigidly excluded from the hotels, as its odour would instantaneously pervade every room, but it is sought elsewhere by the guests and eaten with avidity. Semon says of it: “This fruit, like our strong, rich cheeses, is detested by those who are not fond of it.”[33] What various associations are connected with the pleasures of the palate is shown by the _epitheta ornantia_ of a wine list, such as strong, fiery, soft, fresh, lovely, sharp, elegant, hard, spicy, fruity, and smooth. Huysmans, in his novel A Rebours, gives a pathological example of amusement derived from taste association in the following passage. After describing the life of the nervously diseased Des Esseintes, he goes on: “In his dining room was a closet containing miniature casks on dainty sandalwood stands, each one fitted with a silver cock. Des Esseintes called this collection his mouth organ. A rod connected all the cocks, and they could be turned with a single movement answering to the pressure of a knob concealed in the woodwork, filling all the little glasses at once. The organ was standing open, the register with the inscriptions of flûte, cor, voix céleste, etc., displayed, and all was ready for use. Des Esseintes sipped here and there a few drops, playing an inner symphony and deriving from the sensations of his palate pleasure like that produced on the ear by music.” 4. _Sensations of Smell_