attar of roses gave me pause

[AlexanderIII]

Dear all,
this is from the novel The Many Lives & Secret Sorrows of Josephine B. by Sandra Gulland.

This evening I was visited by a market woman, a poissarde. The scent of attar of roses gave me pause.

It's clear that the market woman brought with her an odor of fish and attar of roses was quite to the point. But could you please comment on the expression to give smb a pause?

 

[velisarius]

For me nothing is clear there. There is no mention of fish.

Any of the Parisian market women who led riots during the French Revolution
poissarde | Definition of poissarde in English by Oxford Dictionaries

So the market woman smelled nice - perhaps she had a lover who bought her perfume. If something "gives us pause", it makes us stop and think.

 

[AlexanderIII]

According to several French-Russian dictionaries poissarde is an old (end of XVIII centure) word for a woman-fishmonger.
Anyway it was Rosa's aunt in disguise who came to visit her. So Rose was perplexed by the rose odour, that was not typical for a market worman.
Thank you, Velisarius.

 

[velisarius]

Poissarde (plural poissardes), literally "fishwife", was a contemporary general term for women of the working class. Derived from the French poix (pitch, tar), it is synonymous with their highly stylized urban slang.[28]
Women's March on Versailles - Wikipedia

 

[AlexanderIII]

I see. Thank you, Velisarius.

 

[GreenWhiteBlue]

As you note, Rose was perplexed that a fishwife would smell like perfume. When you are perplexed, you often need to stop and think about whatever it is that is confusing you -- and that is what the expression "give [someone] pause" means: you are hesitant in some way, either because you are puzzled, or because you think something might be unpleasant (as in "hearing that sushi is made of raw fish gave me pause the first time I tried it, but now I love it.") Note that there is no "a" before "pause."

(You might also note that despite the impression you can get from materials used by learners, native English speakers never use the abbreviation "smb" to mean "somebody", and most would probably have no idea what these letters mean. If you want to be understood by native speakers, you must always write out the full word.)

 

[AlexanderIII]

I see. Thank you, GreenWhiteBlue.