— 66 — 



them? On the other hand, who shall blame the consumer who, face to 

 face with such quotations, grows more and more chary of buying such 

 an expensive article as bergamot oil, and steadily more inclined to extend 

 friendly consideration to the artificial oils of commerce? 



For the reasons above described there is very little satisfaction to 

 be derived at present from the bergamot oil business. The exporter, who 

 is confronted with great difficulties in his dealings with customers abroad, 

 and who is responible for the quality of his shipments, has very little 

 inducement nowadays to continue trading in an article in which the 

 opportunities for making profit no longer stand in just relation to the 

 chances of losing money. It only remains to be hoped that in the future 

 better crops will bring about an improvement in the market-position, and 

 that the trade in this fine article of commerce may then regain the interest 

 which for the present it has lost in the eyes of all concerned in it. 



Within the past few weeks the oil-prices have given way slightly, 

 because in a few isolated instances manufacturers have attempted to 

 realize, but there is a total absence of any desire to buy. The present 

 buying-price of the oil ranges from M 60.— to cS 63. — . 



Special stress should be laid upon the fact that oil produced under 

 such unfavourable and abnormal conditions as those of the present season 

 is no match for the product of previous crops, either in respect of quality 

 or of physical constants. Speaking generally, the odour of the present 

 season's oil leaves as much to be desired as do its ester-content, its 

 rotatory power and its specific gravity. As all the oil has been prepared 

 from more or less immature fruit, the low ester content goes together 

 with a very low sp. gr. and an abnormally high rotation, reaching +22 

 and 23° in the case of some few samples. 



Lemon Oil. This important article has undergone numerous and not 

 unimportant fluctuations in the course of the last seven months. The 

 last crop, as is well-known, had yielded only a poor medium result, while 

 at the commencement of the 1910/1911 season there was a very heavy 

 stock of old oil on hand. The old supplies have served to eke out the 

 deficiencies in the more recent output, and throughout the season there 

 has been an abundant supply available to meet the requirements of the 

 export-trade. In the last Report the causes which, in spite of this plen- 

 tiful supply, caused the article to advance at the beginning of Sep- 

 tember to the high level of from c4i 14.50 to <^i 15.— were set forth in, 

 detail. Right from the beginning of the present crop opinions have been 

 divided on the subject of its size: the majority of those interested judging 

 it with great optimism, while others declared it to be smaller than the 

 previous crop. Under the influence of these contradictory views a down- 

 ward tendency declared itself in Messina in the autumn, which strongly 

 affected the prices, both of spot-supplies and of oil for delivery. The 



