the trees had been swept off-ignorant of the history that had passed, and which was even then, as now, in very progress, and which was even then, as now, actually crowding the forest upon the prairie, and bringing about the day when, perhaps a thousand years hence, the prairies, like the forests of Lancashire, will live only in history.

CHAPTER XXV.

SOMETHING ABOUT OIL.

THE very word has wrought like magic. The smell of the article has turned men crazy. It has opened purse-strings which the cries of the orphaned, the tears of the widowed, and the pleas of religion could never loose. It has made men lavish in a hopeless enterprise who had no pence to spare under the counsels of wisdom. It has caused men to scorn the admonitions of the instructed and professional, to trust their own stark ignorance in the stake of a fortune. It has led the self-reliant and pursey capitalist to heap contempt on the wisdom and experience of science, to follow the lead of his own olfactory. All this because "oil" is a synonym for gold.

Auri sacra fames! quid non mortalia pectora cogis?

Since the historical excitement of the "South-Sea Bubble," the business world has hardly been invaded by such a fever of speculation as raged over the Northern United States from 1862 to 1866. When it was positively settled that oil could be drawn from the solid rocks-oil suited to the uses of illumination, gas-making, fuel, and lubricationmen who have the keenest eye to utility, and who counterpoise all values with bullion, were constrained to admit that Providence had done more for our race than they had ever dreamed. No doubt many men made suitable recognition of the services of the Almighty in facilitating the ends of money-getting. The picture which memory treasures, however, is that of a herd of po cine quadrupeds jos

tling each other for the largest share of their master's allowance.

At first it was generally supposed that one locality was as likely as another to yield the oleaginous fluid, and experiments innumerable were instituted wherever men could be found whom the infectious fever had reached. We now know that not one neighborhood in a thousand affords the geological conditions requisite to success. Another precipitate and erroneous conclusion was that which assumed the surface configuration of the earth to be the only essential condition of oil accumulation. Wherever a region could be found with a physical geography like that of Venango County-wherever a creek like Oil Creek had scored a country underlaid by sandstone like Northwestern Pennsylvania—there might have been seen the men whose experienced olfactories were employed to test the odor of every bog, and stain, and film which prying eyes could bring to light. Especially if such a creek were bordered by a flat walled in by rocky bluffs-but most especially if such a flat could be found at the fork of two streams, environed by rocks and hills of Pennsylvania sandstone, were the "oil-smellers" in high ecstasies. Happy the squatter whose steep and rugged hill-sides and narrow intervales afforded these first-class evidences of "productive property." I know of many an instance in which his land was tripled in market value by the magic touch of the magician. of the hazel wand. The same kind of sandstone was essential; and it is marvelous that Nature had so disposed it that the oil-seeker could in every instance detect also the "first," "second," and "third" sandstones after the Venango style. No matter upon what formation the exploration might be progressing-perhaps a thousand feet below or above the geological horizon of Venango County-these oil-hunters, who had a wisdom above geology, could infal

libly parallelize every formation with that of Venango County.

Another popular error was that of regarding beds of coal as the source of the oil. This led searchers for the coveted fluid to prefer the borders of coal-fields, or even the regions underlaid by coal. Often it seemed to be a matter of indifference whether it were calculated that the oil would naturally rise or sink through the rocks. With many the question was never considered. With most, however, the opinion was entertained—and to this day is cherished—that oil naturally descends through the strata. I have seen it gravely stated in published treatises on the subject that our native petroleum is the "drainage of the coal-measures." Nothing could be more erroneous. What connection can exist between the oil deposits of Enniskillen (Ontario) and the nearest coal-beds, at least one hundred miles removed? What between the oil accumulation of Manitoulin Island and the nearest coal-beds two hundred miles distant? Moreover, the coal-measures are every where less saturated with oil than many formations of more ancient origin.

"Surface shows" have been the fascination of many. The places of most copious escape to the surface were regarded as the favored spots where the "drainage from the coalmeasures,” in disregard of the laws of gravity and hydrodynamics, had obligingly deposited itself. Such "shows" were always illusory. A great "surface show" is a great waste. When Nature plays the spendthrift she retains but little treasure in her coffers. This was the lesson learned at great cost by the confident capitalists who took "stock" in the "surface shows" of Paint Creek, in Northeastern Kentucky. The production of petroleum in quantities of economical importance has always been from reservoirs in which Nature for ages had been hoarding it up, instead