intellect. The salutary effects of olive oil over the human system have never been disputed.
The oil was also, and is yet, the basis of many perfumed preparations, and, as ladies of fashion and buxom dandies helong to all ages and to all countries, the use made of olive oil in that direction is not of an uncommon importance.
The fatty oils of low grades, either in their crude state or admixed with different preparations, are used also in considerable amount in soap-making, in lubricating, in lighting, in dyeing, in the manufacture of broadcloth, and they enter in the composition of many ointments and liniments.
It seems unnecessary to dwell on the great importance of the olive oil for table use. In the culinary point of view, it was of the very first necessity among the ancients, where oil cooking was predominant, and where it entered into all the seasonings most generally employed. This practice has happily been transmitted to us, and the use that is made of it nowadays in culinary preparations, sauces, salads, etc., is sufficiently demonstrated by its immense annual production, in which Italy alone figures for about 92,000,000 gallons.
In Spain, where olive oil is the principal seasoning in culinary preparations, enormous quantities are consumed. Italy and Portugal use also a great deal of it in their cooking.
But it is especially in the south of France that oil cooking predominates. The inhabitants of |
