The World. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1891-1896, 1892-11-21
ONE INDUSTRY OF ITALY.
SOMETHING ABOUT THE MAKING OF
OLIVE OIL.


B.ndisd = Crushing IN the sIiii--
Grades sf,sh. oii-rhe EsautlruI Olive
Trsss-Exporsasfon 81 OH.
Oil-malxing, as compared to wine.
making, is serious, not to say dull
occupation. It lis not in early autumn.
but in winter, that the olives ripen. and
in place Of the lively. rapid gathering Of
the beautiful clusters Of the grapes,
there is the STOPPING position and the
slow, steady picking OF the fruit either
from off the tree or of the ground, berry
by berry. Then comes the careful sort
ing Of the olives, upon which. in a great
measure. the quantity Of the oil depends.
1.-THE first olives are gold, the second
silver, the third are worth nothing
says the Tuscan proverb.
When this operation is over, the fruit
Is put into a mill, where it is slowly
crushed into pulp under an enormous
stone wheel, moved by simple contriy-
ance, which is put In motion by water
power in Lucca, that /" land Of streams,
but in the drier portions Of Italy by a
monkey or an OK. This pulp; which
takes lovely purple greenish hue, is
then put into round receptacles woven of
rope, and placed under press, worked
by hand with a bar The oil which ex-
udes trickles down into vat placed on
the floor below, in the bottom of which
there is water.
After this first pressure, which, made
as it usually is of the finest olives, care
fully sorted and washed, produces the
best quality Of oil. the pulp is once more
put into the mill, mixed with a httle
boiling water to he again pressed, pro
dncing oil of d second quality. A third
pressure gives forth the oil for burning,
and in the end the pulp is utilized ais
manure or made up into round cakes for
burning together with the wood fires
When the vat is full into which the
freshly crushed oil IS allowed to run, af-
ter having stood for few days, SO that
all the precious liquid rises well to the
top the oil is drawn off into jars called
in italian " orci, some of which are so
huge as to render the stratagem of the
captain of the Forty Thieves in the
Arabian Nights quite Ineligible In
these receptacles the oil is left to settle
for four-or five days, when the purer oil
rises to the top and is drawn off Some
oil jars have two orifices, from the upper
one Of which the better oil is drawn,
while an inferior kind is taken from the
lower.
Some of these jars used in olden times
to be beautifully ornamental; but such
work is hardly ever done in these days.
The oil when first made has much
deeper color than that we usually see,
and has wonderful and delicious
aromatic flavor, but, like many ether
lovely things, this IS sadly evanescent.
Unfortunately, there is terrible amount
of adulteration carried on with the oil,
sometimes before it leaves Italy, more
often after. it reaches England, so that
some kinds of oil can be bought more
cheaply in England than in Italy. Cot
ton oil. which has neither flavor nor
color, is said to be extensively used for
this purpose.
What olive oil is to the Italians one
must live in Italy toappreciate Tosuch
as like it it is an almost perfect form of
nourishment Beans with oil and salt
are held by the peasants dish fit for the
gods. It is touching to. see how they
will buy even tiny quantities of oil, as if
it were impossible for them to 20 with
out it entirely. Foreigners often com.
plain of the large amount used in Italian
cooking, but, if they would but believe
it, oil is far more digestible when used
for frying than either butter or fat.
Certainly good qualification for resi-
dence in Italy is a liking for oliveoil
A prolonged residence in Italy leads
one to look upon the beautiful soft green
tolive trees with an affection such as no
one who has not experienced it can i'm.
agine. They are SO inseparably bound
up with Italian landscape. Sometimes
t is called a melancholy tree, but those
Who feel the relief which its soft, misty
fleets give to the burning glow Of an
italian summer never find it so. The
trees, too, assume such peculiar shapes
that, when one lives among them, one
learns to know one from another, until
they seem like old friends.
The olive does not, it is true, give
Z much shade, but the color of the air un
derneath it is SO soft and soothing that it
Gains and quiets the nerves in wonder
full way. AS we grow familiar with the
olive we understand how the Athenians
consecrated it to Palas. the Goddess of
Wisdom, and how the Son of Man. seek
ing solitude, . went into the Mount of
Olives. The Italian peasants, who are
not an imaginative people, do not, per
haps, feel the charm of the olive tree as
they do that of the joyous vine and the
thick leaved, shady fig tree but italian
poets love it well, and often celebrate its
praise Its evergreen, too, and cheers
the wintryf landscape with it's soft, gray
ish. green, lighter than the foliage of the
pine, the cypress and the fir.
A large part Of the oil made in Italy is
exported and the export trade is grow
ing. In America the Californian oil
completes with the Italian but in Greece
i H.. Il @. - =