The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1911-02-10
The WILD YLANG-Y LANGf
ESSENCE HAS NO EQUAL FOR
PURE AGGREsslVENEss.
All Right In the Philippine JunsIes,
but Take II Away From There
and It ls Found I'M
possible.

did you ever come across the es-
sence of ylang-ylang?" asked the man
from the Philippines. "The real, un-
adulterated essence, not the perfume,
I mean. Well, If you haven't. you've
certainly got an experience ahead Of
you.
i've never met anything to equal it
for pure aggressiveness; dinosaurs
on the warpath would be mild beside
1t. It's astonishing, too, what it can
do as an essence, when it's even pleas.
at In its other forms.
Il can't think of anything lovelier
than to get the breath of it straight
from the groves. There are plenty of
them in Malabon, a little way out
from Manila; in fact, almost every
native house in the place has little
private forest of them, and to slide
down the river there, with the water
full Of stars and the palms and bam-
boo on the banks shivering in the
moonlight and the soft air in your
face family fragrant with ylang-ylang
there couldn't be anything more per-
feet. It seems to belong with the
songs that float out from the huts
along the shore-we1rd songs without
any beginning or end in wailing wo-
mans voice.
But take It away from there, and
IT'S impossible. No, don't like even
the perfume they make out of it, and
that's tanned down, of course; but as
an essence it's monstrous.
There's factory in Manila where
they distill it from the little green
punches of flowers the natives bring
In by the basketful, and before came
away I pulled together enough cour-
age to go out to it to buy some OF the
essence as curiosity. OF course,
had to be carried away on a stretcher,
and my health Is still somewhat i'm
paired; but I got away with a small
bottle of the stuff.
1.-The other day I let friend Of
mine, woman with taste for strong
perfumes, smell It, To my surprise,
she said she was delighted with it,
and asked If she could have drop for
her handkerchief. AS she was just
leaving gave It to her, and she went
of smiling at it with evident pleas
ure.
'The next morning she called me
out Of bed to the telephone to inform
me that she was going to bring suit
against me as accomplice to the bru-
tai attack made against her by the
ylang-ylang. 1t had been all right, she
said, until she had, got home, and
then It began to make itself obnox-
fous.
1T was worse than a brass band on
her nerves. She had begun by putting
1t under her pillow, then under the
mattress. then she tried burying 1t In
the floor under the carpet; but It was
too strong for her. There wasn't any
place she could put It that It couldn't
get out of.
'She hid it in her various cupboards
and locked the doors, but it wasn't
any use. The thing would slide out
and knock her down every time. She
says all the furniture and clothes in
the room will have to be burned, that
It's more expensive than a smallpox
quarantine.
Finally, when her strength was all
used up, she crawled to the window
and threw out the handkerchief with
the drop on It; but the policeman hap.
pened to be on his beat about that
time, and he made her take it in. He
said they couldn't have that sort of
thing on the streets.
so the family got together and
made big fire, and they tried to burn
1t out. Did they get rid of It? Not
yet; 1t went up in smoke, and now all
the neighbors are threatening to stone
them"