178 ON THE PERFUMERY TRADE. 



perfumery vendor throughout the country has commenced of late years 

 to make his own toilette articles. It is therefore impossible to form 

 even an approximate idea of the quantity consumed in the United 

 Kingdom. 



The British manufacturers of perfumery make a very creditable show 

 which manifests great improvements in that trade since 1851. The 

 removal of the excise restrictions on soap-making have no doubt ope- 

 rated very favourably in allowing perfumers either to manufacture their 

 own soap, or to have it made for them of the most suitable ingredients for 

 toilet purposes. The greater part of the English scented soaps exhibited 

 are made by the hot process from tallow or palm-oil and soda-lees. 

 A small quantity of rosin and cocoa-nut oil is generally added. The 

 former renders the soap softer and easier to work, increasing at the 

 same time its detergent properties. The latter gives it a fine grain and 

 improves the lather, but it must not exceed a proportion of five per 

 cent, on the fat used, as otherwise its fetid smell would become per- 

 ceptible. The most celebrated of English soaps is the Windsor soap, 

 which is not only much used for home consumption, but also exported 

 largely to all parts of the world. It was originally a white soap which 

 turned slightly brown with age, but it is now coloured artificially with 

 brown umber or burnt sugar. Honey soap is also made in considerable 

 quantities. It is a tallow soap, containing about five per cent, of 

 rosin, and is perfumed principally with oil of citronella. It is an ex- 

 cellent toilet soap, but contains no honey. Several so-called glycerine 

 soaps are also exhibited. Some made by the hot process, which evi- 

 dently contain no glycerine (unless crushed in afterwards), as it is 

 pumped out with the waste lees, others made by the cold process, 

 which have retained all the glycerine of the fat, to which, in some 

 ca^es, more has been added mechanically. 



Some very fine specimens of transparent soap are exhibited. A few 

 best and expensive soaps are also shown, but they appear scarcely equal 

 to the French ; a circumstance easily explained, as the market for them is 

 exceedingly limited in the United Kingdom, and consequently but little 

 inducement is offered to manufacturers. On the other hand we must 

 say that after carefully comparing the ordinary British toilet soaps 

 with those of foreign soaps, they seemed to us to be decidedly superior 

 to any others. The commonest of them afford a copious lather, and leave 

 a clean pleasant smell to the hands, an advantage rarely to be found in 

 any ordinary foreign soap. Their price is also proportionately cheaper, 

 due regard being had to the quality ; and this arises from several causes 

 — the facilities afforded by English markets for procuring the necessary 

 ingredients on the best terms, various improvements effected in the manu- 

 facture, but above all the great simplicity of the process used for reducing 

 soap into saleable shapes ; for whilst abroad soaps are cut up, crushed 

 pounded, made into balls, dried and then stamped, English soaps being 

 generally of a softer consistency are simply cut up into suitable 



