Mr. Ellena was literally born into the business, growing up near the French perfume capital, Grasse.

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But my favorite excursion was to An Dinh Palace, a French-style royal residence on the Perfume River built by a Nyugen emperor for a crown prince, whose mother lived in the home until her death.

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Legend has it that when Marie Antoinette was caught at Varennes trying to escape the French Revolution, rebels recognized the queen because of her Houbigant perfume, which only royalty could afford.

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Eventually, during a trip to Paris, I was coerced by the garlicky perfume emerging from my brother's appetizer of escargots (as the French call the edible land-based ones), and I caved.

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But when the last descendant of the Houbigant family fell ill in the 1980s and began selling off the perfume brands, Michele Perris and his relatives, longtime devotees of the French brand, decided they had better start buying them.

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