AMjuiytri;  m2RM' }      Notes  on  American  Asphaltum.  313 
ated  cylinder,  and,  as  the  coal  oil  boils  at  a  much  higher  temperature 
than  either  ether  or  petroleum  spirit,  the  former  -will  remain  in  the 
glass  cylinder,  while  all  the  ether  or  petroleum  spirit  will  be  evapo- 
rated. The  best  way  for  evaporating  the  ether  or  spirit  will  be  to 
put  the  glass  cylinder  containing  the  same  in  a  vessel  with  hot  water. 
— -American  Chemist,  May,  187 '2,  from  The  Oil  Trade  Review. 
NOTES  ON  AMERICAN  ASPHALTUM. 
By  Prof.  J.  S.  Newberry. 
All  my  observations  on  asphalts  have  resulted  in  the  conviction, 
that  without  exception  they  are  more  or  less  perfectly  solidified  resi- 
dual products  of  the  spontaneous  evaporation  of  petroleum.  In  many 
instances  the  process  of  the  formation  of  asphalt  may  be  witnessed  as 
it  takes  place  in  nature,  and  in  our  oil  stills  we  are  constantly  pro- 
ducing varieties  of  asphalt.  These  are,  in  some  instances,  undistin- 
guishable  from  the  natural  ones,  and  in  general  differ  from  them  only 
because  our  rapid  artificial  distillation  at  a  high  temperature  differs 
from  the  similar,  but  far  slower,  distillation  that  takes  place  sponta- 
neously at  a  low  temperature. 
Asphaltum  occurs  in  America,  as  does  petroleum,  in  an  immense  num- 
ber of  places — so  many  that  I  cannot  enumerate  even  one-half  of  those 
known  to  me.  I  will,  however,  notice  a  few  of  the  most  interesting. 
The  asphalt  from  these  various  localities  exhibits  great  diversity  of 
physical  character,  and  some,  of  chemical  composition.  These  differ- 
ences are  doubtless,  in  part,  due  to  differences  in  the  petroleums  from 
which  they  have  been  derived.  The  greatest  noticeable  diversity  is, 
however,  probably  due  to  difference  of  age,  and  is  a  record  of  the 
slow  but  constant  changes  which  time  affects  in  these,  as  in  other  or- 
ganic compounds. 
Among  the  most  important  of  our  asphaltic  minerals  are  the  Alber- 
tite  and  Grahamite ;  the  first  from  New  Brunswick,  the  second  from 
West  Virginia.  Both  these  are  found  filling  fissures,  opened  across 
their  bedding,  in  strata  of  carboniferous  age.  The  geology  of  the 
districts  where  these  deposits  occur,  has  been  described  by  Professors 
Dawson  and  Lesley,  and  it  is  unnecessary  now  to  repeat  the  details 
which  they  have  given.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  the  fissures  filled  by 
both  the  Albertite  and  Grahamite  mark  lines  of  disturbance,  where 
the  strata  are  more  or  less  tilted  and  broken,  and  where  oil  springs 
