As a matter of course, dry perfumes are of greater antiquity than fluid; aromatic substances require merely to be dried in order to retain their fragrance permanently. The oldest civilized people known in history—Egyptians, Assyrians, Persians, Babylonians, and the Jews, as numerous passages in the Bible prove—used dried portions of plants, leaves, flowers, and resins as perfumes and incense.

To this day there is kept up quite a trade in Valeriana celtica, a strong-scented Alpine plant, and in powdered amber, with the Orient, where they are used for scent bags and incense respectively. The Catholic Church retains to the present time the Jewish rite of burning incense, and in our museums will be found urns, taken from Egyptian graves, from which pleasant odors escape even now after nearly four thousand years, owing to the aromatic resins with which they are filled. It is said, too, that the delightful volatile odors of our handkerchief perfumes were first prepared by an Italian named Frangipanni conceiving the idea of treating a dry mixture of different aromatic plants with alcohol and thus imparting the odor they contained to the latter.

Not all aromatics can be made into sachet powders; it is well known that the delightful odor of violets changes into a positively disagreeable smell when the flowers are dried, and the same remark applies to the blossoms of the lily of the valley, mignonette, lily, and most of our fragrant plants. On the other hand, some portions of plants, especially those in which the odorous principle is contained not only in the flower but in all parts of the plant, as in the mints, sage, and most LabiatÆ, remain fragrant for a long time after drying and hence can be employed for sachets. Besides the plants named, lavender, rose leaves, the leaves of the lemon and orange tree, Acacia farnesiana, patchouly herb, and some other plants continue fragrant after drying.

Any vegetable substance to be used for sachets must be completely dried so as to prevent mould. The drying should be effected in a warm, shady place, sometimes in heated chambers; direct sunlight and excessive heat injure the strength of the odor, a portion of the aromatics becoming resinified and volatilized. If artificial heat is employed, a temperature between 40 and 45° C. (104-113° F.) is most suitable.

The external form of this class of preparations varies of course with the public for which it is intended. Expensive sachets are sold in silk bags with different ornamentation; those intended for the Orient are generally put up as small silk cushions richly ornamented with gold and colors to suit Oriental taste. Cheap sachets are sold in envelopes or in round boxes. It is customary to have the ingredients ground or finely powdered, for which purpose small hand-mills will generally suffice.