Prior to the removal of the excise duty upon soap, in 1853, it was a commercial impossibility for a perfumer to manufacture soap, because the law did not allow less than one ton of soap to be made at a time.  This law, which, with certain modifications had been in force since the reign of Charles I, confined the actual manufacture of that article to the hands of a few capitalists.  Such law, however, was but of little importance to the perfumer, as a soap-boiling plant and apparatus is not very compatible with a laboratory of flowers; yet, in some exceptional instances, these excise regulations interfered with him; such, for instance, as that in making soft soap of lard and potash, known, when perfumed, as Creme d’Amande; or unscented, as a Saponaceous Cream, which has, in consequence of that law, been entirely thrown into the hands of our continental neighbors.

FIG SOFT SOAP is a combination of oils, principally olive oil of the commonest kind, with potash.

NAPLES SOFT SOAP is a fish oil (mixed with Lucca oil) and potash, colored brown for the London shavers, retaining, when pure, its unsophisticated “fishy” odor.

The above soaps constitute the real body or base of all the fancy scented soaps as made by the perfumers, which are mixed and remelted according to the following formula:—­

The remelting process is exceedingly simple.  The bar soap is first cut up into thin slabs, by pressing them against a wire fixed upon the working bench.  This cutting wire (piano wire is the kind) is made taut upon the bench, by being attached to two screws.  These screws regulate the height of the wire from the bench, and hence the thickness of the slabs from the bars.  The soap is cut up into thin slabs, because it would be next to impossible to melt a bar whole, on account of soap being one of the worst conductors of heat.

The melting pan is an iron vessel, of various sizes, capable of holding from 28 lbs. to 3 cwt., heated by a steam jacket, or by a water-bath.  The soap is put into the pan by degrees, or what is in the vernacular called “rounds,” that is, the thin slabs are placed perpendicularly all round the side of the pan; a few ounces of water are at the same time introduced, the steam of which assists the melting.  The pan being covered up, in about half an hour the soap will have “run down.”  Another round is then introduced, and so continued every half hour until the whole “melting” is finished.  The more water a soap contains, the easier is it melted; hence a round of marine soap, or of new yellow soap, will run down in half the time that it requires for old soap.

When different soaps are being remelted to form one kind when finished, the various sorts are to be inserted into the pan in alternate rounds, but each round must consist only of one kind, to insure uniformity of condition.  As the soap melts, in order to mix it, and to break up lumps, &c., it is from time to time “crutched.”  The “crutch” is an instrument or tool for stirring up the soap; its name is indicative of its form, a long handle with a short cross—­an inverted ‘T’, curved to fit the curve of the pan.  When the soaps are all melted, it is then colored, if so required, and then the perfume is added, the whole being thoroughly incorporated with the crutch.