360  The  Razv  Material  Situation.  {AmjuJn0eurIJI9arm' 
all  constantly  using.  The  average  price  of  these  25  materials  in 
1914  before  the  war  was  thought  of  was  $17.00.  By  the  middle  of 
last  year,  before  the  end  of  the  war  was  clearly  foreshadowed,  this 
average  price  had  risen  to  $33.50,  almost  one  hundred  per  cent.  At 
the  present  time  the  same  25  materials  represent  an  average  of 
$28.50,  which  is  to  say  that  they  have  lost  only  about  a  third  of  the 
total  advance  and  still  average  more  than  50  per  cent,  higher  than 
their  pre-war  level.  Such  an  average  price  of  course  means  nothing 
to  the  individual  who  paid  $65.00  for  methyl  anthranilate  last  year 
and  now  sees  the  price  at  about  $15.00;  but  it  has  some  value  as  a 
composite  of  the  actual  performances  of  the  market. 
As  to  the  present  position  and  apparent  prospects  of  individual 
materials  or  groups  of  materials,  I  shall  limit  myself  to  a  few  brief 
references.  The  synthetic  situation  is  now  clearing  up  fairly 
rapidly,  and  comparatively  few  products  remain  unobtainable.  The 
release  from  their  war  status  of  such  chemicals  as  acetone,  toluol 
and  the  like,  has  already  been  reflected  in  the  materially  increased 
supply  and  lower  prices  of  such  products  as  the  ionones,  benzyl 
compounds,  and  others.  Ability  to  bring  forward  heavy  accumula- 
tions of  clove  spice  from  Africa  has  lowered  clove  oil  fully  ^o  per 
cent,  and  will  have  a  material  effect  upon  the  group  of  aromatics 
derived  from  it  which  include  as  you  know  the  important  carnation 
bases.  The  foreign  manufacturers  of  these  fine  chemicals  are  of 
course  still  struggling  with  enormous  difficulties  and  it  remains  to 
be  seen  just  how  complete  a  recovery  they  can  make  without  going 
to  Germany  for  many  essentials,  as  they  did  before  the  war;  but 
they  can  at  least  now  see  daylight  ahead  and  I  think  we  may  reason- 
ably expect  the  synthetic  line  in  most  if  not  all  of  its  ramifications 
to  be  in  fairly  good  shape  and  on  a  practicable  price  basis  before 
the  end  of  the  year. 
In  the  field  of  natural  floral  products  and  essential  oils  the 
process  of  restoration  may  similarly  be  expected  to  make  reason- 
ably rapid  progress.  The  industries  of  southern  France  and  the 
other  Mediterranean  producing  countries  which  struggled  along  so 
wonderfully  during  the  war  period  are  still  handicapped  enormously 
by  the  want  of  labor,  fuel,  transportation,  raw  materials,  containers 
and  what  not ;  but  conditions  will  undoubtedly  improve  as  steadily 
and  satisfactorily  as  we  have  any  right  to  expect.  Such  oils  as  the 
geraniums,  neroly,  lavender,  ylang  ylang  and  vetivert  continued  to 
