154 



yards, or really, as some Iiave pretended, from an absolute un fitness 

 of the substance in question ; the views of the gallant admiral have, 

 I believe, been invariably thwarted, or his exertions rendered 

 altogether fruitless. I was at Antigua in 1609, when a transport 

 arrived laden with this pitch for the use of the dock-yard at English 

 Harbour : it had evidently been lustily collected with little care or 

 zeal from the beach, and was of course much contaminated with 

 sand and other foreign substances. The best way would probably 

 be to have it properly prepared on the spot, and brought to the 

 state in which it may be serviceable, previously to its exportation. 

 I have frequently seen it used to pay the bottoms of small vessels, 

 for which it is particularly well adapted, as it preserves them from 

 the numerous tribe of worms so abundant in tropical countries *. 

 There seems indeed no reason why it should not when duly prepared 

 and attenuated be applicable to all the purposes of the petroleum of 

 Zante, a well known article of commerce in the Adriatic, or that of 

 the district in Burmuh, where 400,000 hogsheads are said to be 

 collected annually f. 



It is observed by Capt. Mallet, in his Short Topographical Sketch 

 of the island, that " near Cape la Brea (la Braye) a little to the 

 south-west, is a gulf or vortex, which in stormy weather gushes out, 

 raising the water five or six feet, and covers the surface for a con- 

 siderable space with petroleum or tar ;'* and he adds, that on the 

 east coast in the Bay of Mayaro, there is another gulf or vortex 

 similar to the former, which in the months of March and June 

 produces a detonation like thunder, having some flame with a thick 

 black smoke, which vanishes away immediately : in about twenty, 

 four hours afterwards is found along the shore of the bay a quantity of 

 bitumen or pitch, about three or four inches thick, which is employed 

 with success/' Captain Mallet likewise quotes Gumilla, as stating 

 in his Description of the Oroonoco, that about seventy years ago " a 

 spot of land on the western coast of this island, near half way 



* The different kinds of bitumen have always been found particularly ob- 

 noxious to the class of insects. There can be little doubt but that they formed 

 ingredients in the Egyptian compost for embalming bodies, and the Arabians 

 are said to avail themselves of them in preserving the trappings of their horses. 

 Vide Jameson's Mineralogy. 



f Vide Aikin's Dictionary of Chemistry, quoted from Captain Cox in the 

 Asiatic Researches. 



