HISTORICAL SUMMARY. 7 



I write these lines, as they did a hundred years ago. But the most 

 striking feature in Symes' account is the description of the wells, 

 the method of extracting the oil, and the way of carting it down to 

 the shore. In all this there has not been the slightest change, 

 everything is exactly as it was a hundred years ago, only that now-a- 

 days clay pots are used for hauling up the oil ; in fact, I rather 

 believe that this was also the case during Symes' visit, and that the 



II iron " pot which he noticed was an exception. 



The whole description of the oil-fields is, however, not so exhaus- 

 tive as it might be, and, if seen in the light of a report written only 

 two years later, some of Symes' statements have to be accepted 

 with the greatest care. In the first place it cannot be made out 

 which of the two tracts — Berne or Twingon — was visited by Symes. 

 As Captain Cox particularly mentions two distinct oil-fields, I cannot 

 imagine that within such a short time as two years a second oil-field 

 with quite a number of wells could have sprung up. I believe, 

 however, that Symes visited Berne, as all his successors did. 



The next statement refers to the proprietary rights in the land. 

 Symes' statements are too vague, and are contradicted altogether 

 by the report of Captain Cox, whose statements have been independ- 

 ently confirmed by the descriptions of subsequent visitors. It is 

 hardly possible that such wide reaching changes in the proprietary 

 rights of the oil bearing land could have happened within two years, 

 and we shall presently see that Captain Cox's statements deserve 

 much more credit, even had they not been confirmed subsequently. 



As regards the number of wells, Symes is certainly wrong. There 

 cannot possibly have been 500 wells in existence, as the survey of 

 1890-91 has proved that there were then 602 wells all told, of which 

 at least 76 have been constructed during the three preceding years, 

 120 more wells are certainly not older than 35 years. This reduces 

 their number to 304, if we assume that no new wells have been dug 

 between 1797 and 1855. As this is, however, not very probable, we 

 are obliged to assume that at the time when Cox visited the oil- 



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