Notice of a Fountain of Petroleum. 101 
gen, from or through the naptha, and the exterior portion of the 
metal returns, slowly, to the condition of — mpi if 
the stopper is not tight. 963 
_ The petroleum remaining from the distillation, i is thick like pitch 
if the distillation has been pushed far, the residuum will flow only. 
languidly in. the retort, and in cold weather it becomes a soft solid, 
«resembling much the maltha or mineral pitch. 
The famous lake of maltha and petroleum, in the island of Trini- 
dad, is well known: I have specimens from that place, in all the con- 
ditions between fluid petroleum and firm pitch. — It is unnecessary to 
repeat, that the English use it on their ships of war, asa substitute 
for tar and pitch, and that the bituminous mass in the natural lake, 
(which covers several square miles,) is sufficiently tenacious to sup- 
port a man, during the colder part of the year, but at the opposite 
season is too soft to sustain any considerable weight. 
In alluding to the probable connexion, with bituminous coal, of the 
oil spring named at the head of this notice, I did not mean to imply 
that petroleum and other bi arly peers that 
there is coal beneath; for it has been-a ; 
in a limited degree, in many minerals, as =e iron want: the 
phenomena of volcanos, and was proved experimentally by the late 
Hon. George Knox, in an extensive series of researches, published in 
the Philosophical Transactions of London.’ As regards the probability — 
of finding coal, the opinion should be thus modified; if the country 
on whose waters, or in whose rocks, petroleum or other varieties of 
bitumen appear, is such an one as, in its geological structure, is con- 
sistent with the usual associations of coal, then the existence of bitu- 
bane especially if it be abundant, and more especially if the rocks 
th es are impregnated with it, affords a strong presumption in 
favor of the existence of coal beneath. _ Such is the fact in this part 
of the state of New York. The shale at Geneseo is highly bitu- 
minous and burns readily, with abundant fame. I cannot answer 
for the rocks in the immediate vicinity of the Oil Spring, as they are 
not in view. The people have dug a few feet for coal at the distance 
of a few yards from the spring ; the excavation is too shallow to de- 
cide any thing, except that the petroleum rose in this place also, as 
at the spring, thus proving, that the bituminous impregnation is not 
‘peculiar to that spot. 
If these remarks should excite any interest in the minds of landed 
proprietors in that vicinity, I would venture to suggest to them, that 
