Oil of flowers
A French process for obtaining essential oils from flowers or herbs has been described as follows:—Take carded cotton, or split wadding and steep it in some pure Florence oil, such as is quite clear and has no smell. Then place a layer of this cotton in the bottom of a deep china dish, or in an earthen pipkin. Cover it with a thick layer of fresh rose leaves, or the leaves of sweet pink, jasmine, wall-flower, tuberose, magnolia blossoms, or any other odoriferous flower or plant from which you wish to obtain the perfume. Spread over the flower-leaves another layer of cotton that has been steeped in oil. Afterwards a second layer of flowers, and repeat them alternately till the vessel is quite full. Cover it closely, and let it stand in the sun for a week. Then throw away the flower-leaves, carefully press out the oil from the cotton, and put it into a small bottle for use. The oil will be found to have imbibed the odour of the flowers.
Keep the scented cotton to perfume your clothes-presses.