208 
plant grows, in consequence of the earth being of a bituminous nature. 
The Indians obtain from this earth a liquor, useful in curing many 
diseases. Their mode of obtaining it is this : — ^they cut the earth in 
turfs, which they dispose on poles, or thick reeds, in a place exposed 
to the sun, placing beneath them vessels fit to receive the fluid ; since 
the bitumen liquefies, and flows down by the heat of the sun. The 
turfs, which are thus deprived of their bituminous fluid, are after- 
wards employed as fuel. In this case, the connection between these 
two substances appears to be pointed out decidedly, unless it should 
be contended, that their existence thus together might be only acci- 
dental. The frequency, however, with which they are thus found 
together, the form which the bitumen assumes, and indeed the manner 
in which it is blended with the peat or fossil wood, strongly declare 
that the formation of the bitumen depends on the same process as peat. 
Schoockius, as we have already seen, relates, that masses of bi- 
tumen are frequently found among the peat ; sometimes resembling, 
in size and figure, walnuts, eggs, and pine nuts : and although he 
is obliged to acknowledge that undoubted pine nuts were also found 
in the same pits, yet these bituminous masses, found in the same pits 
with them, were so entirely bituminous, that he could not believe 
them ever to have been any thing but a mineral production. 
Stelluto, describing the fossil wood of Umbria, mentions a white 
resinous substance, which was found along with it, and which bore 
the appearance of mastic, or frankincense. 
Dr. Woodward also mentions, that, along with the hazel nuts and 
peat, dug up in the Isle of Wight, were pieces of wood, much impaired 
and decayed, with some small quantities of a black bituminous matter 
in its interstices. The Doctor also describes a resinous matter, which 
was found lying between the bark and the wood of some of the trees 
dug up in Wilmeslow marshes. They call it there, he informs us, 
frankincense*. 
* Vol. I. Part II. p. 18. 
