AGRICULTURE 



Table A World's Production in Metric Tons of Petroleum, 1909, 1910, 



411 



operations recently in progress. Attention has also been directed to exploratory work on 

 the Taman Peninsula. 



Among other countries which may be confidently expected to add largely to the 

 world's supplies of petroleum in the near future is Persia, where there is an immense area 

 of presumably petroliferous lands, a portion of which has already been proved by the 

 test of the drill to be highly productive. Drilling operations in Egypt, on the Gulf of 

 Suez, have also been attended with results which are regarded as sufficiently promising 

 to justify the provision of a large capital for the development of the industry. The 

 island of Trinidad is being systematically examined, and sufficient has been done to lead 

 to the belief that large stores of oil exist there; in 1911 it produced 17,071 metric tons. 

 Among other potential sources of supply which have attracted the notice of the pros- 

 pector are Turkey (Mesopotamia), New Zealand, New Brunswick, Newfoundland, Canada 

 (north-west), Alaska, Venezuela, Barbados, Madagascar, China, Argentina, Algeria, 

 Nigeria, Colombia, Ecuador and Bolivia. There are also sources of oil in the bitumi- 

 nous shale deposits of France, Servia, Spain, South America, New South Wales, New 

 Zealand, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. (BOVERTON REDWOOD.) 



AGRICULTURE 



PROGRESS OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH 



During recent years notable advances have been made in agricultural science and 

 especially in the application of chemistry and biology to agricultural practice. 



The perennial question of the source of the combined nitrogen utilised by vege- 

 tation has received fresh light from the discovery by Beijerinck of a group of bacteria 

 living free in soil and water and possessing the power of bringing the free 

 nitrogen of the atmosphere into combination. These organisms, known 

 as Azotobacter, are powerful oxidisers of carbohydrate material, from which 

 process they derive the energy necessary to effect the fixation of the nitrogen, 

 and they have been identified in cultivated and virgin soils from all parts of the 

 world. They are however only practically effective in soils containing carbonate of 

 lime, though they have been found in all the steppe soils where black soil rich in nitrogen 



The 



question of 

 nitrogen. 



