The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1905-12-14
TRINTDAD's ASPHALT LAKE.
Queer Mining Carried on in West In
dian Island.


supply the bulk of the asphalt of
commerce, says a writer in the New
York Sun.
Brighton has no claim to exist
cnCc aside from the bituminous
pitch that nature here sends bub-
bling up from the bowels of the
earth. The lake Is about a quarter
of mile from the steamship pier.
Nearby are quarters for two hun
dred native workmen, refining
plant offices and quarters for the
half dozen Americans representing
tho company, and that is all, OK
cept for the fierce tropical sun etcr-
nally beating down, and the sharks
that play in the harbor.
But as a natural curiosity and as
commercial enterprise the lake is
OF absorbing interest Imagine a huge
asphalt plaza of more than n hun
dred acres, softened by the sun,
oyorgrown in spots with weeds. COW
cred after a rain with pools of water,
and YOU have the famous pitch
lakC--a big black semi-solid pond OF
asphalt, with surface fairly firm
and apparently placid, but in reality
tyeacherous and eternally in mo-
ton.
Around the edges runs n tramway
with an endless cable hauling the
loaded cars to the refinery and
bringing the empty ones back
again Along this line, where the
pitch is hardest, all the mining of
the product is done-the black
workmen digging 1t out with pick
and shovel.
II is necessary to shift the scene
Of operation only along the line,
never toward the center, as in two
days time the slowly moving viscous
mass OF pitch continually flowing
from the center has reflled the ex-
cavaiOus and made them ready for
the workmcn again. Every day the
rails Of the little tramway are lifted
ana the slowly sinking ties moved
few inches one way or the other in
order that the railway may not en-
tirely disappear in the bottomless
ooZe.
Bottomless 1t may we'll be called.
for soundings have been made until
with no bottom at 140 feet the pipes
and sounding apparatus have been
crushed and swallowed up, to be
disgorged months later. The mining
Of the product is lowering the level
of the lake at the rate of about six
inches year.
The center of this huge volcanic
crater is the source of supply. Here
we see the pitch, boiling up in al
most purely liquid state, spread
ing out over the lake in dozens of
streams, gradually hardening and
imDerceptibly flowing toward the
boundaries in an attempt to find a
level.
1t is horrible to contemplate the
thought of being caught by this aw-
full black quicksand and relentlessly
entombed in its depths. Not long
ago negro workman heroically Of
fered himself for an experiment de-
signed to ascertain how long it
would take for a man to become en-
an hour he slowly sank until only
the upper part of his body remained
in sight and then his companions, in
a burst of cruel humor, made as If to
leave him to his fate. His vociferous
appeals for mercy melted their
hearts. Planks were thrown out over
the pitch, as they are used in rescu-
4,,ar
through the ice, and after an hours
hard work the victim was once more
free and happy.
The lake Is a valuable source of
revenue to the island government.
An export duty if s1.25 a ton and a
royalty of 40 cents ton, by the
terms of the concession, put nearly
quarter of a million dollars a year
into the island treasury. The entire
concession is about 1000 acres, and
asphalt Is found throughout the
whole locality. The land Is fertile
and some of 1t is now being used
with success for the cultivation OF
fruit.
The possibility of exhaustion
seems remote - the Venezuelan
lake, although ten times the area, is
but thirty feet deep. Its surface Is
submerged in water, rendering the
extraction of the product more diff
cult, and a forty mile haul to the
seacoast adds much TO its cost.
For the preparation of paving and
roofing materials the Trinidad va
riety has been found the better
adapted but the purer Venezuelan
article is used largely in the prepar-
alton of varnish. Danger attends
the shipping of the Bermudez pitch
in bulk In the holds of the steamers,
as the slightest list to one side or
the other tends to cause a disas-
trous flow of the pitch to that side.