is a town of six thousand inhabitants, called Borislau, which is
entirely supported by the ozokerite industry. It lies at the foot of
the Carpathian Mountains. About the year 1862, a shaft was sunk for
petroleum at that place. After descending about one hundred and eighty
feet, the miners found all the cracks in the clay or rock filled with
a brown substance, resembling beeswax. At first, the layers were not
thicker than writing paper; but they grew thicker gradually below, until
at a depth of three hundred feet they attained a thickness of three or
four inches. Upon examination, it was found that a yellow wax could be
made of a portion of this substance, and at once a substitute for wax
was manufactured.

The discovery caused an excitement like the oil fever of 1865 in
America. A large number of leases were made. When I saw the wells of
Pennsylvania, in 1879, there were more than two thousand. The owner
of the land received one-fourth of the product, and the miners
three-fourths. In the petroleum region, the leases at first were whole
farms, then they were reduced to 20, then 10, then 5, and at last to 1
acre, which is a square of 209 feet.

But in the ozokerite region of Poland, where everything is done on a
small scale, when compared with like enterprises in this country, the
leases were on tracts thirty-two feet square. These were so small that
the surface was not large enough to contain the earth that had to be
raised to sink the shaft; consequently the earth had to be transported
to a distance, and, when I saw it, there was a mound sixty or seventy
feet high. Its weight had become so great that it caused a sinking
of the earth, and endangered the shafts to such an extent that the
government ordered its removal to a distance and its deposit on ground
that was not undermined. The shafts are four feet square, and the sides