AMBERGRIS

Manawatu Herald, Volume L, Issue 3909, 19 February 1929, Page 3

AMBERGRIS

WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE. USED IN PERFUMERY. The frequency with which ambergris has been found on Now Zealand beaches during the present summer servos as an excuse for refreshing the public (memory as to what the substance is, and to what uses it is put. Ambergris is a solid, fatty, inflammable substance of a dull grey or blackish colour (the shades being variegated like marble) possessing a peculiarly sweet earthy odour. It occurs as a biliary concretion in the intestines of the spermaceti whale, and is found floating on the sea, on the seacoast, or in sand near the sea. It is found for the most part in the Atlantic Ocean, on the coasts of Brazil and Madagascar, on the coasts of Africa and also in the East Indies, China, Japan and the Molucca Islands. Ambergris is also found in the abdomen of whales, in lumps varying from half an ounce to 100 lb. in weight. When taken from the intestinal canal of the sperm whale it is of a deep grey colour, soft consistence, and a disagreeable smell, but on exposure to the air it hardens, becomes pale, and develops a sweet odour. It melts at about 62 degrees iO. to a fatty yellow, resinous-like liquid, and at 100 degrees it is volatilised into a white vapour. It is soluble in ether, volatile and fixed oils, and is only feebly acted upon by acids.

The use of ambergris in Europe is now entirely confined to perfumery, though formerly it was attributed with medicinal qualities. In minute quantities its alcoholic eolution is much used for giving a “floral” fragrance to scents, washes, and other perfumery. Ambergris is largely used in the East in perfumery and sometimes is utilised in cookery. The high price it commands makes it liable to adulteration, 'but its genuineness is easily tested by its solubility in hot alcohol, by its fragrant odour, and its uniform fatty consistence on being penetrated by a hot wire.