Scientific American Supplement, No. 443, June 28, 1884 | Page 6

in the bags, and pressed a second time. The water used in the process of making oil must be quite pure; the mill, press, bags, and vessels sweet and clean, as the least taint would ruin the quality of the oil produced.
The oil which has collected in the tank or receptacle just mentioned is removed day by day, and the water also drained off, as oil would suffer in quality if left in contact with water; the water also, which necessarily contains some oil mingled with it, is sent to a deposit outside, and at some distance from the crushing house, which is called the "Inferno," where it is allowed to accumulate, and the oil which comes to the surface is skimmed off from time to time. It is fit only for manufacturing purposes.
After the second pressing the olive-pulp is not yet done with; it is beaten up with water by mechanical agitators moved by water-power, and then the whole discharged into open-air tanks adjoining the crushing house. There the crushed olive kernels sink to the bottom, are gathered up and sold for fuel, fetching about 12 francs per 1,000 kilos, while the debris of the pulp is skimmed off the surface of the tank and again pressed in bags, yielding a considerable quantity of inferior oil, called "olio lavato," or washed oil, which, if freshly made, is even used for food by the poorer classes. The pulp then remaining has still further use. It is sold for treatment in factories by the sulphide of carbon process, and by this method yields from seven to nine per cent. of oil, of course suitable only for manufacturing purposes. Only the first two pressings yield oil which ranks as first quality, subject of course to the condition of the fruit being unexceptionable. New oil is allowed to rest a while in order to get rid of sediment; it is then clarified by passing through clean cotton wool, when it is fit for use.
The highest quality of olive oil for eating purposes should not only be free from the least taint in taste or smell, but possessed of a delicate, appetizing flavor. When so many favorable conditions are needed as to growth, maturity, and soundness of the fruit, coupled with great attention during the process of oil-making, it is not to be wondered at that by no means all or even the greater part of the oil produced in the most favored districts of Tuscany is of the highest quality. On the contrary, the bulk is inferior and defective.
These defective oils are largely dealt in both for home consumption and export, when price and not quality is the object.
In foreign countries there is always a market for inferior, defective olive oil for cooking purposes, etc., provided the price be low. Price and not quality is the object, so much so that when olive oil is dear, cotton-seed, ground-nut, and other oils are substituted, which bear the same relation to good olive oil that butterine and similar preparations do to real butter.
The very choicest qualities of pure olive oil are largely shipped from Leghorn to England, along with the very lowest qualities, often also adulterated.
The oil put into Florence flasks is of the latter kind. Many years back this was not the case, but now it is a recognized fact that nothing but the lowest quality of oil is put into these flasks; oil utterly unfit for food, and so bad that it is a mystery to what use it is applied in England. Importers in England of oil in these flasks care nothing, however, about quality; cheapness is the only desideratum.
The best quality of Tuscan olive oil is imported in London in casks, bottled there, and bears the name of the importers alone on the label. There is no difficulty in procuring in England the best Tuscan oil, which nothing produced elsewhere can surpass; but consumers who wish to get, and are willing to pay for, the best article must look to the name and reputation of the importers and the general excellence of all the articles they sell, which is the best guarantee they can have of quality.
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BEESWAX AND ITS ADULTERATIONS.
Beeswax is a peculiar waxy substance secreted only by bees, and consisting of 80.2 per cent. carbon, 13.4 per cent. hydrogen, and 6.4 per cent. oxygen. It is a mixture of myricine, cerotic acid, and cerolein, the first of which is insoluble in boiling alcohol, the second is soluble in hot alcohol and crystallizes out on cooling, while the third remains dissolved in cold alcohol.
Although we are unable to produce real beeswax artificially, there are many imitations which are made use of to adulterate the genuine article, and their detection is a matter of considerable difficulty. Huebl says