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as it is just an imitation of the fragrant joss stick. Occasionally, cypresswood or rosewood powder is added to the mixture. Yet, one thing peculiar to cypress wood and rosewood is that the two never constitute a basic raw material in production of joss sticks. Very often, a chemically produced perfume of the scent Jasmine or Rose is added onto the outer coat of these joss sticks (see Table 2).
RAW MATERIALS
Table 2 Incense Powder Used
NUMBER OF FACTORIES FRAGRANT INCENSE WOOD 15 Aloewood 51 Sandalwood 6 4 Benzoin 9 Lign-aloe-wood 20 Cypress Wood 15 Sawdust 44 Artificial Perfume COLOUR POWDER COLOUR POWDERSource: Fieldwork, Hong Kong, 1987.
c) Manufacturing Processes
The primary basis of classification of incense products is the method of production. There are four ways by which incense products can be manufactured, namely the Lin-hsiang Method, the Nuo-hsiang Method, Moulding and Winding.
Lin-hsiang Method (#7)
Lin-hsiang is a method of mass production by which incense sticks are produced bundle by bundle. The joss stick worker first mixes the different incense powders in the correct proportion. There are more or less six types of powder mixed together in the manufacture of each coat of the joss sticks. The most basic one is a glutinous incense powder, or shih-fên (Zī). This is a kind of powder obtained from a species of tree called Litsea glutinosa. This powder has the characteristics of being sticky when wet so it is used to make the fragrant incense powder adhere to the bamboo canes. The shih-fên so produced is divided into