PERU. 



PETROLEUM, OR ROCK OIL. Coo 



forbade the Spanish war vessels to coal in the 

 ports of the Republic. 



The Peruvian Congress met in July, and had 

 a stormy debate on the Spanish question. After 

 twenty days' discussion it passed the following 

 law : 



ART. 1. The Executive shall make use of every 

 ordinary and extraordinary means and resources 

 which are legally within its powers, to defend, by 

 force, the integrity of the National territory against 

 all aagression or usurpation already consummated, 

 or which in future may be attempted to be consum- 

 mated. 



ART. 2. Congress resolves that the Executive power 

 do make war against the Spanish government 

 ( " Haga la guerra al Grobierno de Espana"), as a last 

 resource to obtain the most complete and honorable 

 satisfaction for the injuries done by her agents to the 

 Republic, in case the Chincha Islands are not dis- 

 occupied and the National Flag saluted the Execu- 

 tive being empowered to employ, in conformity with 

 its constitutional attributions, every means allowed 

 by the "Law of Nations" for entering into official 

 relations with the above-mentioned Government. 



The Government promulgated this law on 

 September 7. The Ministry tailed, however, to 

 give satisfaction to Congress, and were replaced 

 by another. The new Minister of Foreign Af- 

 fairs, Sefior Calderon, addressed a circular to 

 the Diplomatic Corps, which more directly 

 pointed to the commencement of hostilities. 

 He thus interpreted the law of September 7 : 



That law is both for war and for peace ; it is for 

 war, because it requires the revindication of our 

 property and the chastisement of the aggressors as 

 soon as the Executive shall be ready for action and 

 in possession of the necessary materials of war ; it 

 is not opposed to peace, disposing terminantly the 

 settling of the pending difficulties in a peaceable way, 

 in case it may be obtained upon favorable terms, 

 before or after the commencement of hostilities. 



Soon the Congress, however, found out that 

 the new ministry hesitated as much to go to 

 war as its predecessor. Accordingly the fol- 

 lowing resolutions were passed on November 

 26th by a unanimous vote: 1. The Executive 

 shall at once give the necessary orders for the 

 removal of the Spanish forces from the Chincha 

 Islands, and shall report to Congress within 

 eight days. 2. The Executive Power shall not 

 be authorized to treat with the Cabinet of 

 Madrid until the recovery of the Chincha 

 Islands shall have been effected. 



In the meanwhile Spain had sent a new 

 envoy to Peru, Gen. Pareja, who was the 

 bearer of an ultimatum, in which the Spanish 

 Government asked from that of Peru a prompt 

 and complete satisfaction for all its grievances, 

 threatening, at the same time, that if this de- 

 mand should not be complied with, the Span- 

 ish squadron would take possession of the prin- 

 cipal ports of the republic and destroy the 

 Peruvian squadron. 



The Peruvian Government, in this plight, 

 sought counsel and aid from a Congress of 

 South American republics, which met at Lima 

 on November 16, and was composed of the 

 representatives of Peru, Bolivia, Chile, the 

 Argentine Republic, Ecuador, the United States 

 of Colombia, and Venezuela. The proceedings 



of this Congress were to be secret, but it waa 

 generally known that the first business taken 

 up by the Congress was the difficulty between 

 Spain and Peru, and that it was resolved to 

 notify the Spanish admiral, that in case of a 

 war, the other republics would make the cause 

 of Peru their own. To this communication the 

 admiral replied that he did not know a South 

 American Congress, and could not recognize 

 its authority to interfere in the matter be- 

 tween his country and Peru. Of the subse- 

 quent proceedings of the Congress nothing 

 was divulged. 



Negotiations were then again opened. Gen. 

 Yivanco was despatched in the Peruvian steam- 

 er Chulaco on Dec. 29 to the Chinchas. He 

 asked and obtained full powers from his Gov- 

 ernment to treat and terminate the difficulty, 

 and it was understood that he agreed to most 

 of the Spanish demands, receiving, on the 

 other hand, the promise that the Spanish 

 forces would evacuate the Chincha Islands, and 

 the Spanish Government recognize the inde- 

 pendence of Peru. 



PETROLEUM, OR ROCK OIL, is the name 

 given in a general way to all the varieties of 

 mineral or earth-produced oils : that is, to all 

 those liquid or semi-fluid oily substances which, 

 in various regions of the world, are found 

 saturating or exuding from the soil or rocks, or 

 rising in the manner of springs at the earth's 

 surface, or are reached and procured by sink- 

 ing wells, that pierce the cavities or porous 

 strata within which, as in reservoirs, the oils 

 have during some previous period become ac- 

 cumulated. The word petroleum (Lat., petra 

 and oleum), signifies rock oil ; and to the na- 

 tive oils in question have also been given such 

 names as earth oil (oleum terra), naphtha, ~bank 

 oil, carbon oil, coal oil, and as obtained from 

 particular localities or for particular uses, Sen- 

 eca oil, oleum Galianum (that obtained at 

 Gabian, in Languedoc, called also red petro- 

 leum), &c. 



Nature and Relations of Petroleum : General 

 View. The mineral or earth oils are invariably 

 of mixed or complex character, and usually 

 such in very high degree ; since, apart from 

 intermixed permanent gases, and from water, 

 or other incidental foreign matters, each of 

 them consists in the main of a collection of 

 several distinct hydrocarbons. According to 

 Mr. B. H. Paul, the most important and largest 

 part of their material is a series of hydrocar- 

 bons homologous with marsh-gas (i. c., light 

 carburetted hydrogen, or hydride of methyle, 

 Ci H.t), and of which series this gas is at once 

 the first member and the type. This collection 

 of hydrocarbons may be called the marsh-gas 

 series of constituents of petroleum. It is ex- 

 hibited in the following table, which is slightly 

 abridged from one contained in the paper of 

 Mr. Paul, on the subject of "Artificial Light 

 and Lighting Materials," read before the Brit- 

 ish Association for the Advancement of Science, 

 1864 : 



