Note 97 — HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION. (continued 2)

Dioscorides and Pliny describe a process, which may be considered that of distillation in its infancy; it consists in obtaining oil from pitch, by spreading over it while boiling, fleeces of wool, which receive the vapour and afterwards yield it by expression. In this country the art of distillation was unknown at the time when the Romans had possession of it. It is said to have been introduced in the early part of Henry II.