It becomes a question of vital importance to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and to every citizen interested in the industrial concerns of the State, that the extravagant waste of natural gas, now going on every where throughout the oil- and gas-region should be stopped. The action of the Philadelphia Company, which is now the largest natural-gas company in Pennsylvania, in shutting in the wells all the surplus gas which is not needed, should be emulated by every individual who has pecuniary interest in gas-wells; and it is a question which should be settled by our State Legislature, by compelling all gas-well drillers and operators to shut in the gas which is not needed.

Although I believe the present manufacturing and domestic consumers of natural gas will not return to coal for fuel when the gas is exhausted, but will use a manufactured fuel-gas, yet at the same time, a region such as Pittsburgh, where natural gas is so abundant, must always have an advantage over a community depending upon manufactured fuel gas; and as long as the Pittsburgh supply of gas can be kept up, it will induce manufacturers to establish their works at Pittsburgh in preference to other places, and thus add to the wealth of the State. For this reason it behooves every citizen of the State whether in Pittsburgh, in Philadelphia (where natural gas will never be found), or elsewhere, to prevent the criminal waste of gas which is now going on in so many localities in Western Pennsylvania.

In Ohio, as far as developed, all the natural gas horizons are contained in Paleozoic strata, from the Upper Coal-Measures down and into the Trenton limestone. The most prolific gas-bearing rocks are the Berea grit in the Sub-carboniferous Period, and the Trenton limestone in the lower Silurian Period.

Professor Orton calls the territory in which gas is obtained in the Berea grit and Trenton limestone high-pressure territory, and the territory in which the gas comes from the Ohio, Clinton, Medina, and Hudson River shales, low-pressure territory.

The discovery of natural gas in Ohio, if the deposits are suffici ently great and constant in their supply for commercial purposes, is the dawn of a most important era for the manufacturing and industrial interests of that State. One circumstance is worthy of special mention in this connection. In Pennsylvania, the finding of natural gas has been confined largely to the region in which valuable coals were already being mined and were supplying a cheap and desirable fuel

to established manufacturers. In Pennsylvania, again, the finding of natural gas will, probably, be always confined to regions producing coal, or regions but a few miles removed from coal-mines, and in which coal can be commanded almost as cheaply as in those gas localities immediately at the coal-mines. But in Ohio, gas has been found in areas which do not produce as good a coal for manufacturing purposes as in Pennsylvania, and in other areas, many miles removed from any coal-field.

Any comparison as to the amount of gas which Pennsylvania and Ohio respectively will be able to produce in the future, would be invidious, and in fact we have not sufficient evidence upon which to base any reliable conclusion. That there is sufficient gas in Ohio, as well as in Pennsylvania, to meet the demands of manufacturers for a number of years, and sufficient in many localities to warrant the erection of new plants there is no doubt; but still it is well to bear in mind that our gas-supply is exhaustible, and that our future supply is now stored in buried rock-reservoirs. When these reservoirs are emptied our supply will have gone.

The literature on the subject of the geological occurrence of natural gas, except in areas contiguous to the Pennsylvania oil-regions, is very meagre; and scarcely anything has been published on its geology, except that contained in the reports of the Pennsylvania Survey, in a pamphlet report recently published by Dr. Orton, State Geologist of Ohio, and in special private communications by Mr. Carll, Dr. Chance, Prof. White, and myself.

RUSSIAN PETROLEUM.

SINCE the chapter on this subject in this volume was printed, the announcement is received in this country of a new and "the greatest outburst of oil ever known."

6

Mr. Charles Marvin, writing to the Pall Mall Gazette' (London),

says:

"The Russian newspapers just received contain a telegram from Baku, announcing the greatest outburst of oil ever known. It runs thus: 'Baku, October 5-At Tagieff's wells a fountain has commenced playing at the rate of 30,000 pouds of petroleum an hour. Its height is 224 feet. In spite of its being five versts from the town the petroleum sand is pouring upon the buildings and streets.' It is astonishing that the St. Petersburg correspondents of the London papers should not have telegraphed this remarkable phenomenon, and I can only account for their remissness on the grounds that they have either been too pre-occupied with Bulgarian matters, or have grown so accustomed to fresh oil fountains at Baku, lately, as to be blunted to the significance of the present one. Yet Tagieff's 'gusher' beats, out-and-out, every previous record in the oil-regions of the two hemispheres. The champion petroleum fountain up to now has been the 'Droojba,' which in 1883 spouted to the height of 200 feet or 300 feet, at the rate of nearly 3300 tons of oil a day. This single well,' I wrote from the spot in that year, 'is spouting more oil than all the 25,000 wells in America yield together.'

"Such an outflow was looked upon as almost incredible, and had there not been other Englishmen at Baku at the time, I should have probably fared as badly as Bruce and other travellers. But the Droojba is now nowhere. Tagieff's well is spouting nearly 500 tons an hour, or more than 11,000 tons of oil a day. If it were in London it would top the Monument by 20 feet, and the mansions of faroff Belgravia would be covered with its greasy dust. During the birth throes of a Baku oil fountain stones are hurled a terrific distance, and a high wind will carry the fine sand, spouting up with the oil, miles away. The roar of the gas preceding the oil-flow is terrific,

and the atmosphere for a time is rendered almost unbearable. Compared with such fountains as the Droojba and Tagieff, the Great Geyser of Iceland is a pigmy. Luckily the gas soon clears off, the stones cease to rattle about the surrounding buildings, and then the fountain becomes as orderly as those in Trafalgar Square, pouring upwards sky high with a prodigious roar and forming round about the 13-inch or 14-inch orifice vast shoals of sand, beyond which the petroleum gathers in lakes large enough sometimes to sail a yacht in. "How long Tagieff's spouter' will last, and what its ultimate yield will be, will depend upon circumstances. The Droojba lasted 115 days, flowing for 43 days at the average rate of nearly 3400 tons a day, 31 days at 1600 tons, 30 days at about 900 tons, and 11 days at 600 tons. The owners then managed to fix a 'cap' over the orifice, and placed the well under control. The total amount of oil spouted, at the very lowest estimate, was 220,000 tons, or 55,000,000 gallons; the highest estimate put it at 500,000 tons. At a rough estimate, had the oil spouted in America, it would have realized about a million sterling, and made its owner a millionaire, instead of which the fate of the fountain at Baku was to render its master a bankrupt; for the shoals of sand engulfing neighboring buildings led to claims of damage surpassing what he got for the small quantity of oil he was able to catch and store, while the rest, flowing beyond on to other people's property, was in most cases annexed' and not paid for. It is to be hoped that Tagieff & Co. will not be so unlucky; but in any case most of it is sure to be wasted."

Mr. Marvin has just published in London a pamphlet bearing the significant title The Coming Deluge of Russian Petroleum,' in which he calls attention to the fact that this industry is now attracting the attention of every country in Europe but his own, and arrives at the conclusion that unless England displays immediate promptness and energy the petroleum trade of not merely Baku, but of the world, will slip through her fingers. While England has constructed but two or three tank steamers, the Swedes, he says, have built nearly one hundred for the Volga and Caspian alone.

INDEX.

BEL TESTER, the, illustrated | American and Russian petroleum, com-