The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1889-01-27
FLORIDA FLOWER FARMS.
Perfum e-Making a Rising Industry
Employment for Hundreds.

Perfum O. Making a Rising Industry
Employment for Hundreds.
Nelo York Tribune, Fort Meade (Fid.) Letter.
Raising flowers flor the manufacture Of
perfumery is an industry that is just getting
a foothold in thesouth. Yankee brains and
capital have opened up new fields of labor
and profit in this state in wonderful way
since the war; and now it is claimed that
altar of roses can be made in Florida with
as much success as in the gardens of Bull
garia. The two varieties of roses grown
are the musk and damask, and all attempts
to raise them in parts of Europe other than
q smsll region on the southern slopes of
the Balkan mOuntains-a tract of land not
over thirty miles wide and 800 long-have
failed Yet on the southern slopes of the
Blue Ridge mountains, and in parts of
Florida, these same varieties of roses flour
ish abundanty, and 1t Is claimed that
eighteen acres we'll managed will yield
$4,000 per annum. The other flowers that
are used for distillation, such as jasmine,
vioetS, lilies and jonqulls, are all hardy
here and yield Tich harvests of flowers to
generous cultivation. The only question of
making the perfumer's art a leading in
dustry down here is the capital needed, and
the Yankee go-aheaditiveness. Both of these
seem about to be furnished in the near
future.
A representative of a large northern
house las been prospecting around and ex-
perimenting with the flowers. He expressed
himself as being well pleased with the sue
cess of his work, and factory for the dis
tllation of the flowers will shortly be erected
somewhere in the south as result of his
visit This will give employment to HUNDREDS
of people, and make flowe farming a pay
ing as well as a pleasant industry. The
terry TO many people, and interesting to all
who use the sweet-scented extracts
on their handkerchiefs or clothes There
are two chief processes by which
odors are extracted and retained. One is
by distillaton; the other, and by far the
more delicate and interesting, is by absorp-
ton, or eniuerage. This is resorted to in
the case of such flowers as the rose, jasmine
tuberose and cassia, where the essence is SO
fine that it has by practice been found to
be injured by heat. The principle of odor
absorption from flowers is based simply on
the established law of affinity which hydro
carbons have for perfumes. When these
have been highly purified they catch, and
in catching concentrate and intensity, the
odors 5mmunicated to them.
The method is of the simplest and is not
always of the cleanest order The visitor
10 the perfume factory would see multitudes
-
inches in depth, in which are set several
sheets Of glass. These frames are lifted TO
a bench, and all the glasses are spread over
with layers of pure fat, somewhat less than
a quarter OF an ncl thick, and over this fat
are rarefully shed the leaves Of whatever
flowers mag bs plentiful at the season,
fresh and full Of odor. After the flower
leaves are spread out, the glasses are
replaced in the frame, one on top OF the
other, till each frame looks like a solid
box Of fat Next the frames are slid into
boxes made to receive them, something like
strawberry boxes, and these are then
Closely shut. In very short time the fat
will have caught all the odor, and having
caught it will hold it, too. The next ques-
ton is to free the imprisoned spirit. The
fat is cut up into small square portions and
put into alcohol The delicate essence at
once parts from its coarser companion,
aud uniting itself to the alcohol is fit for
the market.
Another method, but not so commonly
followed, is TO spread the flowers upon
cloth saturated with oils, which, when the
absorption is supposed to have ended, are
placed in a press and the imDregnated oil
squeezed out. The number Of the so-called
perfumes is without end, and is largely a
matter Of fashion. Still, various standing
divisions Of odors have been made, the
most elaborate of them all Icing that Of
Rirumel. HIS classification comprises only
the pleasant Oders, and it is based on a
principle that just as there are primary
colors from which all secondary shades are
made. 50 are there primary odors with
types. all other aroma being more or less
closely connected with them. or these
types be finds eighteen groups.