136 
Talbot, who had assisted him in making the bores and ob- 
taining considerable information respecting the moss, asso- 
ciated with it, was printed with the Annual Report of the 
Manchester Geological Society for 1843. After describing at 
length the beds of peat and the deposits of silt dividing 
them, the authors conclude, <c The only remarkable feature 
connected with the upper bed of peat, is the western por- 
tion of it being covered up with a bed of sand, and being 
probably sometimes subject to an infiltration of sea water, 
according to Mr. Harkness's information. These circum- 
stances, added to the fact of petroleum being found most 
plentifully at the edge of the sand, lead the authors to the 
conclusion that it is produced by the decomposition of the 
upper bed of peat under the sand. 
“ The chemical process by which such singular effects 
have been produced, is a subject more fitted for the consi- 
deration of the chemist than the geologist, but the authors 
suppose that the petroleum is the result of slow combustion 
in the peat, and has been produced by a process partly 
analogous to that which takes place in the destructive dis- 
tillation of wood in close vessels, where, owing to a total 
absence of oxygen, the combination of hydrogen and car- 
bon, in the form of hydrocarbons, is effected.” 
On the 26th November, 1848, he went to Downholland 
and showed this deposit to Mr. James Young, and explained 
to him how the petroleum was there formed. This was 
before he accompanied that gentleman to Riddings, at 
Easter, 1849, and went down Mr. Oakes’ pit where the deep 
coal was wrought, and petroleum flowed from the roof. At 
both those places the supply of petroleum was not sufficient 
for commercial purposes on an extensive scale. The Bath- 
gate works were the cause of the petroleum trade in 
America. There (in Scotland) paraffine oil was first made 
on a large scale and introduced as an article of commerce. 
In the suit of Young v. White and others, tried at West- 
