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A carpenter, according to the adage, is known by his chips. And it was by the simple removal of some superfluous marble, as everyone knows, that the Venus of Milo was revealed to the world—which is only another way of saying the same thing.

But what sort of a carpenter is he who leaves among his chips the mouldings of his door? And what should we say of the sculptor, even in these days, who would treat as a superfluity his lady’s chin?

No mention of the vomero-nasal or Jacobson’s organ! A serious, nay! a damning, defect.

So here am I trying to atone for the sin of omission by giving the neglected item place of honour in my Preface. “The stone which the builders rejected....”

But my motive for erecting it here, in the gateway to my little pagoda of the perfumes, is not quite so simple as I am pretending. The fact is that in my capacity as creator I predetermined, I actually foredained, the omission from my text of the structure to which “Parker devotes a whole chapter.”

I am sorry in some ways. But as the Aberdeen minister so consolingly said: “There are many things the Creator does in His offeecial capacity that He would scorn to do as a private indiveedual.”