One thing is certain, and that is, the Government is well aware that there are great possibilities associated with the shale-oil industry of Scotland, and it is not only watching developments with direct interest, but is doing all in its power to foster the industry, and by all means possible encourage the exploitation of areas so far not commercially developed. At some future date there is a great possibility that the present area for developments will be largely extended, and as this is written, there is much evidence forthcoming to suggest that this commercial development of new lands will not long be delayed. CHAPTER XIII A FEW NOTABLE PETROLEUM ENTERPRISES No brief survey of the petroleum industry would be complete were reference not made to a few of those remarkable commercial undertakings in various parts of the world whose interests are not only closely associated with it, but to whose energies has been due much of the expansion that has been witnessed in every direction during the past few decades. It is safe to assert that, had it not been that the petroleum industry has, in its various industrial and commercial aspects attracted the attention of some of the finest financial and business houses in the world, the wonderful progress which has been recorded would, for the most part, have been impossible. The first place must of necessity be given to that much maligned amalgamation of capital, the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, which was formed as far back as 36 years ago by Mr. John D. Rockefeller and his associates for the primary purpose of developments in the petroleum industry of the United States. At that time, the petroleum production of America had become quite a factor in commerce, but it was, obviously, in want of a guiding hand which could not only place it upon a basis of solidity, but which would tend to remove much of that gambling element which had become almost part and parcel of all developments. The Company, at the head of which were several gentlemen who had already made themselves famous in the land of oil, launched out in several directions, and, through the numerous subsidiary concerns which it soon created, it owned very extensive oil-bearing properties in practically every oil-field of the States, while it built quite a network of pipe-lines for the conveyance of the oil from the fields to the refineries, and from the refineries to seaboard. It erected and equipped oil refineries, and, so as to provide the much-needed foreign markets for American petroleum products, it built its fleet of oil tankers; and, lastly, opened depots for the distribution of American petroleum products all the world over.