St. Charles City Republican intelligencer. [volume] (St. Charles City [Charles City], Iowa) 1857-1861, 1860-09-20
Stienti6t.
OIL WELLS, OIL SPRINGS, &C.

The abundance of oil in wells re-
Gently sunk in the vicinity Of the Al
Icghany river, Pennsylvania, illus
tratcs what Job says, that there was
a time in tic days of his prosperity,
when the rocks poured him forth riv
crs Of oil
The first wells sunk at kanhawha
Salincs, Va, many years ago, pro-
duccd abundance of Petroleum mine
raj. or Seneca oil, and it was put up
in barrels \ few years since, an ar
tcsian well was sunk in the bed of a
river in Alabama, aud oil rose to the
surface and ran out Of the top of the
we'll in great abundance, and tloated
ON the surface of the water of the riv-
er, and became iguited, and the sur
I face water of the river was soon Gov
| cred with a sheet of fame as far as
| the oil extended.
| In the Island of Barbados, West
! Indies, there is Il Lake of bitumen,
which produces what is called Bar
BADGES Tar" If this lake could be
! transferred to the latitude of Baftins
I Bay, in the Acrtic zone, it would soon
/ be converted into mass of mineral
coal, by becoming crystalizcd in the
same manner as water forms ice.
In wilderness tours South, in my
| Juvenile days, | saw an oil spring
! Liquid petroleum.; it formed u little
pond in which leaves and sticks had
fallen, and on the borders of this pool
the petroleum had become crystaliZcd,
and | lifted with stick that had be-
come EMBEDDED in the crystalized
petroleum, piece which had become
coal
When Capt. Hartsticn's Expedition
returned from the Arctic Zone, l re-
ceivcd several large pieces of bitumin-
Gus coal obtained at Haroe Island
latitude about 70o North-in this coal
were crystals of yellow translucent
naptha, which had become soliditied
by cold. 1t rcscmbled some spcci-
mems of gum copal | had seen. In
this climate these crystals and the
coal lose their volatile properties, and
become dry and crumble like rottei
: black shalc.
At the kanhawha Salincs, two sal
wells have been sunk to the depth o
, sixteen hundred feet, and discharge
+ with the salt water carburcttcd hydro
: gen gas, which rises TO the height o
5 seventy feet above the top of tn,
, wells. This gas is collected anC
t burnt as fuel in the salt furnaces toI
! evaporating salt water for the manu-
f facturc of salt The combustion o
: the gas produces hard, spongy en-
| crustation on the outer surface OF tht
+ bottom of the kettles exposed to the
e fire, in which may be seen what ap
S pears like the roots of grass and the
= roots of small plants. Tubes insert
b ed in the wells (Artesian) become
5 coated on the inner surface with al
: incrustation formed 10y the gas an'
A water, of a quarter inch i'll thickness
c the outside black like the bark o
e some trees, and the inner surface ant
l. interior white like the meat of
5 cocoanut. The water and the ga
e from the great depth of sixteen huI
- drcd feet is as cold in the hottest da
C in summer as northern blast i'll thi
l. latitude in mid-wintcr. These well
y present the converse of the deep we
o at Greenelle, near Paris, and destro
d the foundation Of the theory OF tn
French Savans, that the earth II
IF crcases in warmth and heat III propoi