— 62 — 



trade which do not satisfy the requirements of the Dutch Pharma- 

 copoeia. No objection whatever could have been raised against a 

 publication having such a purpose, if Visser had not made the 

 mistake of regarding adulterated oils as pure, and of drawing con- 

 clusions from these erroneous premisses. In order to avoid confusion, 

 it was obviously necessary to correct such a mistake, although it can 

 be understood that the reason why Visser believed the oils to be 

 pure was that they were alleged to come from reliable sources. One 

 of the oils in question was even reputed to have been obtained from 

 us as "01. lavand. Ph. Ned. IV", but its characteristics were such 

 (di5° 0,900, «r> — 13,5°, ester content 38,9%) that we feel bound 

 here to give an explicit denial to this assertion. We declare that 

 lavender oils of such a description would not be supplied, and have 

 never been supplied, by us. Unfortunately the firm to whom we are 

 said to have supplied the oil had nothing left of it, so that we are 

 unable to clear up the misunderstanding involved in the assertion. 



With the object of increasing the interest in lavender growing in 

 the South of France, L. Lamothe has published a new article entitled 

 il la Lavande" *) which, broadly, contains all the information which we 

 have already quoted from this author's publications on previous occas- 

 ions 2 ). A new statement is that in the principal lavender growing 

 districts a syndicate of distillers has been formed for the purpose of 

 undertaking the cultivation and distillation of lavender on rational lines. 

 Since last year this syndicate has already acquired a number of modern 

 stills, and it is said to have produced oils with an ester-content of 

 from 40 to 57%. Its sphere of activity extends over the entire 

 region of the Upper Drome, the Hautes-Alpes and the Basses-Alpes, 

 which is known to produce by far the best oils. Adjoining this 

 district is that of the Italian Alps, with a lavender oil of inferior 

 quality, and, as a third zone of cultivation, the region of the Lower 

 Drome and the Vaucluse. 



The output of oil in the various Cantons is somewhat as follows: 

 La Motte - Chalancon and Sederon, 4500 kilos each; Luc-en-Diois 

 3000 kilos; Bourdeaux, Saillans, and Remuzat each 2500 kilos; Dieu- 

 lefit, Nyons and Buis-les-Baronnies each 2000 kilos oil of the best 

 lavender; the Cantons of Pierrelatte, Grignan, and St. Paul-Trois-Chateaux 

 together 2 500 kilos of lavandin oil 3 ). As already stated in our last 

 Report 4 ), the total output of the Department of the Drome is there- 

 fore on the average 28000 kilos of oil. 



*) La Parfumerie Moderne 1 (1908), 3. 



2 ) Report November 1908, 76. 



3 ) Report October 1906, 44. 



4 ) Report November 1908, 78. 



