l6 NOETLING : PETROLEUM IN BURMA. 



centre of the cross-beam, and embracing it, is a hollow revolving cylinder, with a 

 channel to receive a drag-rope, to which is appended a common earthen pot that is 

 let down into the well, and brought up full by the assistance of two persons pulling 

 the rope down an inclined plane by the side of the well. The contents of the pot 

 are deposited for the time in a cistern. Two persons are employed in raising the 

 oil, making the whole number of persons engaged on each well, only four. The 

 oil is carried to the village or put in carts drawn by a pair of bullocks, each cart 

 conveying from ioto 14 pots of 10 viss each, or from 265 to 371 pounds avoir- 

 dupois of the commodity. The proprietors store the oil in their houses at the 

 village, and there vend it to the exporters. The price, according to the demand, 

 varies from four tecals of flowered silver, to six tecals per 1000 viss, which is from 

 five pence to seven pence half penny per cwt. The carriage of so bulky a commo- 

 dity, and the breakage to which the pots are so liable, enhance the price, in the 

 most distant parts to which the article is transported, to fifty tecals per 1000 



viss 



" Petroleum is used by the Burmans for the purpose of burning in lamps, and 



smearing timber to protect it against insects The quantity exported to foreign 



parts is a mere trifle, not worth noticing. It is considered that a consumption of 

 thirty viss per annum, for each family of five and a half persons, is a moderate 

 average 



" I made such enquiry into the nature of the trade as my short stay 



would admit. The number of boats waiting for cargoes of oil was correctly taken, 

 and found to amount to one hundred and eighty three, of very various sizes, some 

 carrying only one thousand viss, others fourteen thousand. According to the 

 Burmese, whom I consulted, the average burthen of the vessels employed in this 

 traffic, was considered to be about four thousand viss. The number now 

 mentioned is rot considered unusual ; and it has been reckoned that, one with 

 another, they complete their cargoes in fifteen days ; they are therefore renewed 

 24 times in the course of the year ; and the exportation of oil according to this 

 estimate will be 17.568,000 viss 



" Of the actual produce of the wells, we received accounts not easily reconcil- 

 able to each other The daily produce of the wells was stated, according to 



goodness, to vary from thirty to five hundred, the average, giving about two 

 hundred and thirty five viss ; and the number of wells was sometimes given as low 

 as fifty, and sometimes as high as four hundred. The average made about two 

 hundred ; and considering that they are spread over sixteen square miles, as well 

 as that the oil is well known to be a very general article of consumption throughout 

 the country, I do not think this number exaggerated. " 



" The celebrated petroleum .veils afford, as I ascertained at Ava, a revenue 

 to the King or his officers. The wells are private property, and belong here- 

 ditarily to about thirty-two individuals. A duty of five parts in one hundred is 

 levied upon the petroleum as it comes from the wells, and the amonnt realized 

 upon it is said to be twenty-five thousand tecals per annum. No less than twenty 

 thousand of this goes to contractors, collectors, or public officers ; and the share 

 ( 62 ) 



