Part 38

When the “kerosene wells” were first struck, the speculations concerning their probable permanency were wild and various. Some maintained that it was but a spurt, a freak of nature limited to a narrow locality, and would soon be over; others asserted forthwith that American oil, like everything else American, was boundless. Neither had any grounds for their assertions, and therefore made them with the usual boldness of mere dogmatism.

Then came a period of scare, started by the fact that wells which at first spouted an inflammable mixture of oil and vapor high into the air soon became quiescent, and from “spouting wells” became “flowing wells,” merely pouring out on the surface a small stream at first, which gradually declined to a dribble, and finally ceased to flow at all. Even those that started modestly as flowing wells did the latter, and thus appeared to become exhausted.

This exhaustion, however, was only apparent, as was proved by the application of pumps, which drew up from wells, that had ceased either to spout or flow, large and apparently undiminishing quantities of crude oil.

Further observation and thought revealed the cause of these changes. It became understood that the spouting was due to the tapping of a rock-cavity containing oil of such varying densities and volatility that some of it flew out as a vapor, or boiled at the mean temperature of the air of the country or that of the surrounding rocks. Such being the case, the cavity was filled with high-pressure oil-vapor straining to escape. If the bore-hole tapped the crown or highest curve of the roof of such an oil-cavern, it opened directly into the vapor there accumulated, and the vapor itself rushed out with such force that a pillar of fire was raised in the air if a light came within some yards of the orifice. We are told of heavy iron boring-rods that were shot up to wondrous heights—and we may believe these stories if we please.

If the bore-hole struck lower down, somewhere on the sloping sides or in the shallow lower branches of the oil-cavern, it dipped at once into liquid oil, and this oil, being pressed by the elastic vapor of the upper part, was forced up as a jet of spouting oil.

In either case these violent proceedings soon came to an end, for as the vapor or oil poured out, the space above the oil-level where the vapor had been confined was increased, and its pressure diminished, till at last it barely sufficed to raise the oil to the surface, and afterwards failed to do that.

It is quite clear from this that the supplies are not “inexhaustible.” The quantity of vapor having been limited, there must also be a limit to the quantity of oil giving off this vapor; the space in the oil-cavern occupied by this vapor having been limited, there must be a limit to the space occupied by the oil. The quantity of oil may be ten times, a hundred times, a thousand times, or ten thousand times, greater than that of the vapor, but in either or any case it must come to an end at last, sooner later.

If there were but a few wells here and there, as at other similar places, such as Rangoon, the Persian oil-wells, etc., the pumping might continue for centuries and centuries; but this is not the case in America. The final boundaries of the oil-bearing strata may not yet have been reached; but so far as they are known they are riddled through and through, and pumped in every direction, so that the end must come at last, though with our present knowledge we cannot say when.

We can, however, say how it must come. It will not be a sudden stoppage, but a gradual exhaustion indicated by progressive diminution of supply. We shall not be suddenly deprived of this important source of light and cheerfulness; but we may at any time begin to feel the pinch of scarcity and consequent rise of price. This rise of price will check the demand, and bring forth other supplies from sources that now cannot be profitably worked on account of the cheapness of American petroleum.

Many of the countries now largely supplied from America have oil-springs of their own, which a rise of price will speedily bring into paying operation.

We have nothing to fear. The fact that in spite of the ruinous prices that have recently prevailed the Scotch oil-makers continue to exist at all, shows us what they may do with a rise of even a few pence per gallon. The thickness and area of the dark shales from which their oil is distilled are so great that their exhaustion is very far remote indeed. The Americans have similar shales to fall back upon when the spontaneous product ceases to flow, but they are quite incapable of competing with us at home on equal terms—that is, when both have to obtain the oil as a manufactured product of artificial distillation.

If anything like moderation were possible in America, the first indications of scarcity would be followed by some economy in working; but this is not to be anticipated. It is more likely that the first rise of prices will attract additional speculation, and the sinking of more wells in the hope of large profits, and this of course will shorten the period of gradual exhaustion, the commencement of which may, for aught we know, be very near at hand, especially if the new projects for using petroleum as furnace fuel under steam boilers, and for the smelting, puddling, and founding of iron and other metals, are carried out as they may be so easily at present prices, and with the aid of pipe-lines to carry the crude or refined oil from the wells to any part of the great American continent where it may be required in large quantities.

The old story of the goose that laid the golden eggs seems to be in course of repetition in Transatlantic Petrolia.

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Since the above was written I have received from Dr. Sterry Hunt a copy of his interesting “Chemical and Geological Essays,” in one of which he expounds a theory of the origin of petroleum. He states that it appears to him “that the petroleum, or rather the materials from which it has been formed, existed in the limestone rocks from the time of their first deposition,” and “that petroleum and similar bitumens have resulted from a peculiar transformation of vegetable matters, or in some cases of animal tissues analogous to these in composition.”

The objections on page 275 apply to the animal tissues of this theory, and as regards the vegetable matter I think it fails from the want of anything like an adequate supply in these limestone rocks.

THE ORIGIN OF SOAP.

A history of soap would be very interesting. Who invented it? When and where did it first come into common use? How did our remote ancestors wash themselves before soap was invented? These are historical questions that naturally arise at first contemplation of the subject; but, as far as we are aware, historians have failed to answer them. We read a great deal in ancient histories about anointing with oil and the use of various cosmetics for the skin, but nothing about soap.

These ancients must have been very greasy people, and I suspect that they washed themselves pretty nearly in the same way as modern engine-drivers clean their fingers, by wiping off the oil with a bit of cotton-waste.

We are taught to believe that the ancient Romans wrapped themselves round with togas of ample dimensions, and that these togas were white. Now, such togas, after encasing such anointed oily skins, must have become very greasy. How did the Roman laundresses or launders—historians do not indicate their sex—remove this grease? Historians are also silent on this subject.

A great many curious things were found buried under the cinders of Vesuvius in Pompeii, and sealed up in the lava that flowed over Herculaneum. Bread, wine, fruits, and other domestic articles, including several luxuries of the toilet, such as pomades or pomade-pots, and rouge for painting ladies’ faces, but no soap for washing them. In the British Museum is a large variety of household requirements found in the pyramids of Egypt, but there is no soap, and we have not heard of any having been discovered there.

Finding no traces of soap among the Romans, Greeks, or Egyptians, we need not go back to the pre-historic “cave men,” whose flint and bone implements were found embedded side by side with the remains of the mammoth bear and hyena in such caverns as that at Torquay, where Mr. Pengelly has, during the last eighteen years, so industriously explored.

All our knowledge, and that still larger quantity, our ignorance, of the habits of antique savages, indicate that solid soap, such as we commonly use, is a comparatively modern luxury; but it does not follow that they had no substitute. To learn what that substitute may probably have been we may observe the habits of modern savages, or primitive people at home and abroad.

This will teach us that clay, especially where it is found having some of the unctuous properties of fuller’s-earth, is freely used for lavatory purposes, and was probably used by the Romans, who were by no means remarkable for anything approaching to true refinement. They were essentially a nasty people, the habits of the poor being “cheap and nasty;” of the rich, luxurious and nasty. The Roman nobleman did not sit down to dinner, but sprawled with his face downwards, and took his food as modern swine take theirs. At grand banquets, after gorging to repletion, he tickled his throat in order to vomit and make room for more. He took baths occasionally, and was probably scoured and shampooed as well as oiled, but it is doubtful whether he performed any intermediate domestic ablutions worth naming.

A refinement upon washing with clay is to be found in the practice once common in England, and still largely used where wood fires prevail. It is the old-fashioned practice of pouring water on the wood ashes, and using the “lees” thus obtained. These lees are a solution of alkaline carbonate of potash the modern name of potash being derived from the fact that it was originally obtained from the ashes under the pot. In like manner soda was obtained from the ashes of seaweeds and of the plants that grow near the seashore, such as the salsover soda, etc.

The pot-ashes or pearl-ashes being so universal as a domestic bi-product, it was but natural that they should be commonly used, especially for the washing of greasy clothes, as they are to the present day. Upon these facts we may build up a theory of the origin of soap.

It is a compound of oil or fat with soda or potash, and would be formed accidentally if the fat on the surface of the pot should boil over and fall into the ashes under the pot. The solution of such a mixture if boiled down would give us soft soap.

If oil or fat became mixed with the ashes of soda plants, it would produce hard soap. Such a mixture would most easily be formed accidentally in regions where the olive flourishes near the coast, as in Italy and Spain for example, and this mixture would be Castile soap, which is still largely made by combining refuse or inferior olive oil with the soda obtained from the ashes of seaweed.