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Essential Oils (Dippel's Oil)

Dippel's Oil.

Obtained from hartshorn, distilled without addition, rectifying the oil, either by a slow distillation in a retort, etc., no bigger than is necessary, and saving only the first portion that comes over, or with water in a common still; it is very fine and thin, and must be kept in an opaque vessel, or in a drawer, or dark place, as it is quickly discolored by light. It is anti-spasmodic, anodyne, and diaphoretic, taken in doses of from 10 to 30 drops, in water.

Oil of Bitter Almonds Is obtained by the distillation of the crushed kernels; at the same time hydrocyanic acid is formed and passes over with the oil. The crude oil is therefore poisonous. It is sometimes used in medicine for the hydrocyanic acid which it contains, but is uncertain. It is used in perfumery and confectionery. When cakes are flavored with it, the hydrocyanic acid can do little or no mischief, as it is driven off by the heat employed.

Artificial Oil of Bitter Almonds Is made by action on true benzole (not that distilled from petroleum) of fuming nitric acid or a mixture of equal parts of ordinary nitric and sulphuric acids. It is of a yellowish color; is poisonous; is used for making aniline (see COAL TAR COLORS), and in perfumery. Its chemical name is nitro-benzole; it is sold as "Essence of Mirban."

By heating benzoate of ammonia, an oily liquid having exactly the bitter almond smell, is obtained. It is not used. It is known in chemistry as benzonitrile.

Oil of Geranium, From the leaves of the Pelargonium odoratissimum, is used in perfumery. It is adulterated with ginger-grass oil. It is used to adulterate attar of roses.

Artificial Oil of Geranium May be obtained by distilling benzoate of copper.

It has not come into practical use. Its chemical name is benzcxyl.

Krumholz' Oil.

Obtained by distillation from Hungarian balsam.

It is distinguished from oil of turpentine, which is commonly sold for it, by its golden color, agreeable odor, and acid oiliness of taste. Foreign Oil of Lavender.

This is the true oil of spike, and is obtained from the flowers and seeds of broad-leaved lavender, and more commonly those of French lavender, stœchas, with a quick fire. It is sweet-scented, but the oil of the narrow-leaved lavender, or English oil, is by far the finest. Essence of Lavender.

The oil of the flowers of lavender is rendered more delicate in its odor by age; but to prevent its becoming glutinous by keeping, which it is very apt to do, draw it over in a water-bath, with a small quantity of alcohol, which is termed the essence, and which, after being kept closely corked for about 7 years, possesses a peculiarly fine delicate odor of lavender, entirely free from empyreuma. Oil of Lemon Is obtained by expression and distillation. It is used in confectionary and perfumery. When old it acquires the taste and smell of turpentine.

Oil of Lemon-grass.

Antropogon nargus, is a grass which grows in India, Ceylon, and the Moluccas. The oil is extensively used in perfumery. Oil of Marjoram, Origeat majorana, is used in perfumery. The dried herb yields about 10 per cent. of oil.

Oil of Meadow Sweet.

The Spiræa ulmaria is sometimes used as a stimulant and in perfumery.

Artificial Oil of Meadow Sweet Is made by distilling salicin, a crystalline, bitter principle, obtained from the leaves and young bark of the willow, with bichromate of potassa Oil of Mint.

Obtained from the dried plant. Six lbs. of fresh leaves will yield 3½ drs.; and 4 lbs. dried will yield 1½ oz. It is stimulant, carminative, and antispasmodic.

Essence of Neroli.

Obtained from the flowers of the orange tree.

Six cwt. of flowers will yield only 1 oz. of oil.

Petits grains is an inferior oil of neroli obtained in the same manner, but less care being taken in the selection of the flowers. Another essence is obtained from orange-peel, and is very fragrant.

A third essence is obtained from unripe oranges, and is of a gold color.

Oil of Nutmegs.

Obtained from that spice; it is liquid, and of a pale yellow; a sebaceous insipid matter swims upon the water in the still.

Oil of Patchouly.

Obtained by distillation from the Pogastemon patchouli, a plant grown extensively in India and China. One cwt. of the herb yields about 28 oz. of essential oil. It is used in perfumery.

Oil of Peppermint.

Obtained from the dried plant. Four lbs. of the fresh herb will yield 3 drs. In general it requires rectification to render it bright and fine. It is stimulant and carminative.

Oil of Pennyroyal.

Obtained from the herb when in flower. Three lbs. will yield 6 drs. Emmenagogue.

Oil of Pimento.

Obtained from allspice. One oz. will yield 30 drops. It is stimulant.

Oil of Rhodium.

Obtained from the true lignum rhodium. Eighty lbs. will yield 9 drs., and in very resinous old wood 80 lbs. will yield 2 oz. It is light yellowish, but grows red by keeping. Another oil is obtained from the root of rose-wort, rhodiola rosea; it is yellowish, and has the smell and taste of that from the true lignum rhodium. One lb. will yield a drachm.

The True Riga Balsam.

Obtained from the shoots of the Aphernousti pine, pinus cembra, previously bruised and macerated for a month in water. It is pellucid, very liquid, whitish, and has the smell and taste of oil of juniper.

Butter of Roses.

Obtained from the flowers of damask roses, white, solid, separating slowly from the rosewater. It has little scent of its own, and is used to dilute the scent of musk, civet and ambergris.

One cwt. of roses will yield from an oz. to an oz.

Oil of Rosemary.

Obtained from the flowering tops; it is sweetscented. One cwt. will yield 8 oz.; 1 lb. of dry leaves will yield from 1 to 3 drs.; 70 lbs. of fresh leaves will yield 5 oz.

Oil of Rue.

Obtained from the dried plant; it is carminative and antispasmodic. Ten lbs. of leaves will yield from 2 to 4 drs.; 4 lbs. in flower will yield 1 dr.; | retort with essence, and as the receiver is tubuand 60 lbs . will yield 21 oz.; 72 lbs., with the seeds, will yield 3 oz.

Oil of Sassafras.

Obtained from the sassafras root. Twenty-four lbs. will yield 9 oz.; 30 lbs. will yield 7 oz. and 1 dr.; and 6 lbs. will yield 2 oz.

Oil of Sandal Wood.

There are three kinds of sandal or santal wood, the white, yellow and red. The yellow is most used in perfumery. One cwt. of the wood will yield nearly 30 oz. of otto.

Oil of Spearmint, Mentha viridis, is used in medicine as a carminative, and in perfumery. Oil of Tar.

Obtained by distilling tar. It is highly valued by painters, varnishers, etc., on account of its drying qualities; it soon thickens of itself, almost to a balsam. The pyroligneous acid that comes over with it is useful for many purposes.

Oil of Thyme.

Obtained from the plant; 2 cwt. fresh will yield 5 oz.; 3 lbs., dried, will yield a dr. It is stimulant and caustic; and used in toothache, applied to the tooth.

Oil of Tongua.

Obtained from the tongua, or tonka bean.

Dipterix odorata is sometimes used in perfumery.

The bean contains also a camphor-like body and benzoic acid.

Oil of Turpentine.

Distilled, in Europe, from common turpentine, with the addition of about 6 times as much water; but in America, where the operation is carried on upon a very large scale, no water is added, and its accidental presence is even dreaded, lest it should produce a disruption of the stilling apparatus:

To Rectify Oil of Turpentine.

Pour 3 parts of turpentine into a glass retort, capable of containing double the quantity of matof containing double the quantity of matter subjected to the experiment. Place this retort on a sand-bath, and having adapted to it a receiver 5 or 6 times as large, cement with paste made of flour and water, some bands of paper over the place where the 2 vessels are joined. If the receiver is not tubulated, make a small hole with a pin in the bands of cemented paper, to leave a free communication between the exterior and interior of the receiver; then place over the retort a dome of baked earth, and maintain the fire in such a manner as to make the essence and the water boil. The receiver will become filled with abundance of vapors, composed of water and ethereous essence, which will condense the more readily if all the radiating heat of the furnace be intercepted by a plate of copper, or piece of board placed between the furnace and the receiver. When the mass of oil subjected to experiment has decreased nearly two-thirds, the distillation must be stopped. Then leave the product at rest to facilitate the separation of the ethereous oil, which is afterwards separated from the water, on which it floats, by means of a glass funnel, the beak of which is stopped by the finger.

This ethereous oil is often milky, or merely nebulous, by the interposition of some aqueous parts, from which it may be separated by a few days' rest.

The essence, thus prepared, possesses a great degree of mobility, and is exceedingly limpid. Another Method.

The apparatus employed in the preceding process may be used in the present case. Fill the lated, apply to the tubular a small square of paper moistened with saliva, to afford a free passage to the vapors. Graduate the fire in such a manner little more than the oil contained in the retort as to carry on distillation very slowly, until a is obtained. Separate from the product, a very small quantity of exceedingly acid and reddish ethereous essence; by these means the operation water, which passes at the same time as the is much shortened. The oil of turpentine which remains in the retort is highly colored, and thicker than the primitive essence. It may be used for extending fat, varnish, or for coarse oil painting.

Balsam of Turpentine, or Dutch-drops.

Obtained by distilling oil of turpentine in a glass retort, till a red balsam is left. they come over; first a white oil, then yellow, Or, by distilling resin and separating the oils as lastly a thick red oil, which is the balsam. It is stimulant and diuretic.

Essence of Vitivert rhizoma of an East Indian grass. Used in per- Is obtained by distillation of the kus-kus, the fumery.

Oil of Wintergreen, From the leaves of the gaultheria procumbens, is stimulant and carminative. Used in medicine, confectionary, and perfumery.

Oil of Wormwood.

Obtained from the herb; stomachic: 25 lbs. of green wormwood will yield from 6 to 10 drs. of oil; 4 lbs. of dry will yield 1 oz.; and 18 lbs. only 14 troy oz.

Adulterations of Volatile Oils.

The most common are resinous matters, fixed oils, the cheaper volatile oils, and alcohol.

Resinous and fatty matters are left behind when the oil is evaporated; the latter communicate a with a gentle heat, and are comparatively insolugreasy stain to paper which does not disappear ble in alcohol. Both are left behind when the oil is mixed with water and distilled. smell and taste, and specific gravity. Oil of tur- The cheaper volatile oils are detected by the pentine (often used) may be detected by it being undissolved when the oil is treated with 4 times its volume of alcohol of a specific gravity of 0.84. Oil of geranium in oil of rose (a very common adulteration) is detected by sulphuric acid, which developes an unpleasant odor if the geranium oil be present, but has no effect upon pure oil of rose. Alcohol is largely used in adulteration. Take some small pieces of fused chloride of calcium in ined, and heat gently to 212° Fahr. If much the bottom of a test tube, add the oil to be examoil to be examdissolved, if only a small quantity the fragments alcohol be present the chloride of calcium will be will fall together and form a pasty mass at the bottom of the tube.