PLANT ANALYSIS AS AN APPLIED SCIENCE 187 
and washing are conducted with great care. The stability 
of the fat is increased by its digestion with benzoin. The 
“infusion” is effected in large jacketed boilers, in which 
the fat is warmed by steam heat and the flowers are added. 
In the month of May over 10,000 kilos of rose or bigarade 
flowers pass daily for many successive days into the boilers of 
the factory of one house alone. The fat is diligently stirred by 
female workers; the expression by means of hydraulic presses 
is done by men. After the clearing of the fat, the finished 
“pommade” is at once weighed and stored in tin boxes. 
In the case of the more delicate perfumes, the above method 
of “infusion a chaud” is replaced by “enfleurage.” For this 
purpose light square wooden frames, about eighteen inches 
each way, in which a plate of glass can be placed, are used. 
Upon each glass is spread a quantity of fat in a thin layer, 
and this is strewn thickly with flowers. Sometimes contact 
with the fat is avoided, and the layer of fat is confined to the 
other glass wall of each compartment. When a perfumed oil 
is desired, cloths saturated with oil for the “enfleurage” may 
be used. The flowers are shut up in these glass compartments 
for a longer or shorter time, and are repeatedly renewed and 
replaced by fresh ones. The perfumed fat is mixed with 
alcohol by means of powerful stirrers. The alcohol takes up 
scarcely any of the fat, but the greater part of the odorous 
substances. 
From several trials, I think these processes of extraction 
may be applied to extract the delicate odors of barks and other 
substances which would be destroyed by distillation, and have 
escaped detection up to this time. 
Among the chemical substances recently introduced into 
the field of chemical industry 1 may be mentioned cholesterin, 
or lanolin, C26H44O + H 2 0 . Commercially, this substance 
is obtained from animal sources; but its wide distribution 
through the vegetable kingdom warrants its mention in this 
place. The singular property of this substance and its prom- 
1 “Notes on Chemical Substances Recently introduced into the Field of 
Chemical Industry,” by J. Levinstein. Jour. Soc. Chem. Industry, Nov. 29, 
1886. 
