Nisha Naik--Brave New World: Ch.11

The return to civilization
was for her the return to soma, was the possibility of lying in bed and
taking holiday after holiday, without ever having to come back to a headache or
a fit of vomiting, without ever being made to feel as you always felt after peyotl,
as though you’d done something so shamefully anti- social that you could
never hold up your head again.

And, in effect, eighty-three almost noseless black brachycephalic Deltas were
cold-pressing.

Thenceforward she
remained in her little room on the thirty-seventh floor of Bernard’s apartment
house, in bed, with the radio and television always on, and the patchouli tap
just dripping, and the soma tablets within reach of her hand- there she remained;
and yet wasn’t there at all, was all the time away, infinitely far away, on
holiday; on holiday in some other world, where the music of the radio was a
labyrinth of sonorous colours, a sliding, palpitating labyrinth, that led ...

The scent organ was playing a delightfully refreshing Herbal Capriccio- rippling
arpeggios of thyme and lavender, of rosemary, basil, myrtle, tarragon; a
series of daring modulations through the spice keys into ambergris; and a slow
return through sandalwood, camphor, cedar and newmown hay (with occasional
subtle touches of discord-a whiff of kidney pudding, the faintest suspicion
of pig’s dung) back to the simple aromatics with which the piece began.

Forty-seven snubs by
forty-seven hooks; forty-seven receding by forty-seven prognathous chins.

“Malthusian Drill,” explained the Head Mistress.

The scent organ was playing a delightfully refreshing Herbal Capriccio- rippling
arpeggios of thyme and lavender, of rosemary, basil, myrtle, tarragon; a
series of daring modulations through the spice keys into ambergris; and a slow
return through sandalwood, camphor, cedar and newmown hay (with occasional
subtle touches of discord-a whiff of kidney pudding, the faintest suspicion
of pig’s dung) back to the simple aromatics with which the piece began.