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 288 PERFUME of Philip III. his wife and children, who had been kept in prison, were liberated (1599), but all his efforts to be recalled to Spain were in vain. Besides his Relaciones already mention- ed, he wrote Cartas familiares, several politi- cal works, and a life of Philip II. which has never been printed. He wrote in remarkably idiomatic Castilian, and many of his pointed sayings have become proverbial. Much light has been thrown upon his career by M. Mignet in his Antonio Perez et Philippe II. (Paris, 1845 ; translated into English in 1846). PERFUME, a term applied to the scent arising from odoriferous bodies, and also to these bodies themselves when they are prepared especially for the sake of their agreeable odor. The art of preparing them is called perfumery, and by the French is made to include the compounding of a great variety of articles for toilet use, as pomades, hair powders, oils, depilatories, cos- metics, dentifrices, soaps, &c., all of which are scented by the introduction of perfumes. From the most ancient times perfumes of various sorts have been held in high estimation. Solomon (Prov. xxvii. 9) remarks that "ointment and perfume rejoice the heart." They were pre- scribed as medicines by Hippocrates, Crito, and other ancient physicians. It is affirmed that after the destruction of the clove trees by the Dutch in the island of Ternate, the colony suf- fered from epidemics unknown before ; and in times when the cholera has prevailed in Lon- don and Paris, those employed in the perfu- mery factories have escaped its ravages. The Egyptians prepared perfumes for different pur- poses, as for embalming the dead, as offerings to the gods, and for domestic uses. They anointed their bodies with oil, and it was the custom to pour sweet-scented oils upon the heads of newly arrived guests. In their tombs are found boxes of alabaster, onyx, glass, ivory, &c., in which the ointments were kept. One of these now in Alnwick castle contains an ointment of which the scent is still retained. The perfumes employed in embalming are also preserved in the mummies. The Egyptians ob- tained the materials of their perfumes, such as bitter almonds and origanum, from their own soil, and also imported perfumes from Arabia and India. In the Bible frequent reference is made to the use of perfumes by the Hebrews. The sweet incense burned upon the altar was a perfume; and "the art of the apothecary," or as some read it " perfumer," is distinctly named in Exod. xxx., where Moses is directed to pre- pare the oil of holy ointment from the princi- pal spices, myrrh, sweet cinnamon, sweet cala- mus, cassia, and olive oil ; and also to prepare a perfume of other spices named near the close of the same chapter. Other nations of anti- quity, as the Phoenicians, Assyrians, and Per- sians, are known to have made great use of per- fumes. The art of perfumery was practised to an extraordinary extent by the ancient Greeks and Romans. The odor of perfumes was an offering to the gods, and the apparition of these was always represented as accompanied by an ambrosial fragrance. Oils, pomatums, and other perfumes were made in great profusion and most lavishly used. After bathing and in their athletic exercises the Greeks used them liberal- ly, and it was their custom to anoint themselves twice or even thrice a day. To such an extent was this carried, that Solon enacted a law for- bidding the Athenians to use them. Their wines were perfumed by infusing in them roses, vio- lets, and hyacinths; the first step, perhaps, in the preparation of alcoholic perfumes. Ca- pua was especially celebrated for its perfumes. One of its principal streets, called the Sepia- si a, was made up entirely of shops devoted to this trade ; and it was also largely carried on in several other towns of southern Italy and Greece. Pliny in his " Natural History " has given a very full account of the extraordinary varieties of perfume in use by the Romans under the emperors. The perfumers (unguen- torii) w r ere mostly Greeks, and occupied a special quarter of the city. Their shops were supplied with aromatics from all parts of the known world, and were a favorite resort for fashionable loungers. The same taste contin- ued under the Greek emperors. The Arabs introduced their use into Spain with many curious receipts, some of which are still pre- served and are supposed to have been handed down from the Egyptians. In the middle ages France and Italy were most conspicuous for the manufacture and use of perfumes. Incense and fragrant tapers were consumed in the Cath- olic churches as early as the baptism of Clovis, the first Christian king of the Franks, in 496. Alcoholic perfumes are supposed to have been first made in the 14th century; and the first of these of which we have an account is Hun- gary water, distilled from rosemary in 1370 by Elizabeth, queen of Hungary, who obtained the receipt from a hermit, and by the use of it is said to have preserved her beauty to old age. Catharine de' Medici, when she came to France to marry Henry II., brought with her a famous Florentine perfumer named Rene, and from that time the French made great progress in the art ; but from .the receipts that have been preserved it appears that their processes were very rude and unscientific. In England a taste for perfumes appears to have been prevalent in the time of Shakespeare; and in that of Dean Swift the shops of the perfumers were the resorts of loungers, as they were in ancient Rome. But their use afterward declined. The manufacture of perfumes is now chiefly carried on in Paris and London, and in various towns near the Mediterranean, especially in the south of France. The fruits and flowers of those sunny regions afford the greatest vari- ety of fragrant odors, and certain towns and districts are famous for their peculiar produc- tions ; as Cannes for its perfumes of the rose, tuberose, cassia, jasmine, and the neroli, ex- tracted from the leaves of the bitter orange ; Nimes for thyme, rosemary, aspic, and laven-