1918] The Romance of Petroleum 329 



WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, 



Friday, J-iine 7, 1918. 



The Hox. Richard Clere Parsoxs, M.Inst.C.E., 



Vice-President, in the Chair. 



Sir Boverton Redwood, Bart., D.Sc. F.R.S.E. M.R.I. 



The Romance of Petroleum. 



PETR0LEU3I is detlned in the Petroleum Act of 1871 as including 

 " any rock oil, Rangoon oil, Burmah oil, oil made from petroleum, 

 coal, schist, shale, peat or other bituminous substances, and any 

 products of petroleum, or any of the above-mentioned oils." 



The scientific definition is even wider, embracing natural gas, 

 solid bitumen and ozokerite. 



It is, therefore, an appropriate introduction, for the suggestion of 

 which I am indebted to the Fullerian Professor of Chemistry, to 

 recall that it was in the Laboratory of this institution, in 1825, that 

 Faraday examined the liquid which separates when the gas made by 

 the destructive distillation of fixed oils is subjected to compression, 

 and isolated from it the hydrocarbon benzene, as well as several other 

 compounds of carbon and hydrogen. 



In 1815, John Taylor was granted a patent for a process described 

 as producing " inflammable air or defiant gas applicable to the pur- 

 poses of giving light " from vegetable or animal oil, fat, bitumen, or 

 resin. This oil-gas, compressed by a method patented by Gordon 

 and Heard in 1819, was supplied by a company having the title of 

 the London Portable Gas Company. It was contained in vessels 

 having a capacity of two cubic feet, which were delivered to the 

 premises of consumers, and returned when empty to be refilled. 

 The liquid which separated when the gas was compressed into these 

 cylinders was that which Faraday examined. 



It is not reasonable to assume that whilst he was ascertaining the 

 chemical constitution and properties of what was actually synthetic 

 petroleum, Faraday can have realised the importance of the part 

 destined to be played by these hydrocarbons in peace and in war. 



Nevertheless, his extended reference to what he describes as the 

 remarkable action of sulphuric acid upon the compounds of carbon 

 and hydrogen which he had isolated, and his subsequent paper on the 

 mutual action of sulphuric acid and naphthalene, appear to indicate 

 that he may have had an intuitive perception of the valuable indus- 



