96 
JOURNAL OF AN EMBASSY 
well. The contents of the pot are deposited 
for the time in a cistern. Two persons are em¬ 
ployed in raising the oil, making the whole 
number of persons engaged on each well only 
four. The oil is carried to the village or port 
in carts drawn by a pair of bullocks, each cart 
conveying from ten to fourteen pots of ten viss 
each, or from 265 to 371 pounds avoirdupois 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 ticals of flow¬ 
ered silver, to six ticals per 1000 viss; which 
is from fivepence to sevenpence halfpenny per 
cwt. The carriage of so bulky a commodity, 
and the brokage to which the pots are so liable, 
enhance the price, in the most distant parts to 
which the article is transported, to fifty ticals 
per 1000 viss. Sesamum oil will cost, at the 
same place, not less than three hundred ticals 
for an equal weight; but it lasts longer, gives 
a better light, and is more agreeable than the 
petroleum, which in burning emits an immense 
quantity of black smoke, which soils every ob¬ 
ject near it. The cheapness, however, of this 
article is so great, that, it must be considered 
as conducing much to the convenience and com¬ 
fort of the Burmans. 
