A larger percentage of the oil-product of the United States is sent abroad than of any other except cotton, while nearly every home in the land is blessed with petroleum’s beneficent light. America has toed the mark so grandly that the petroleum-industry is the one circus bigger inside the canvas than on the posters. Beginning with 1866, the exports of illuminating oils were doubled in 1868, again in 1871, again in 1877 and again in 1891. The average exports per week in 1894 were as much as for the entire year 1864. Not less impressive is the marvelous reduction in the price of refined, so that it has found a welcome everywhere. Export-oil averaged, in 1861, 61½ cents per gallon; in 1871, 23⅝ cents per gallon; in 1881, 8 cents per gallon; in 1891, 6⅞ cents per gallon; in 1892, 6 cents per gallon; in 1894, 5⅙ cents per gallon, or one-twentieth that in 1861. But this decrease, great as it is, does not represent the real reduction in the price of oil, as the cost of the barrel is included in these prices. A gallon of bulk-oil cost in 1861 not less than 58 cents; in 1894, not more than 3½ cents, or hardly one-seventeenth. In January, 1871, the price was 75 cents; in January, 1894, one-twenty-fifth that of thirty-three years before. Consumers have received the benefit of constant improvements and reductions in prices, while thirteen-hundred-million dollars have come from abroad to this country for petroleum. The glimmer has broadened and deepened into noon-day brightness. THE BABY HAS GROWN. PRODUCTION AND PRICES OF CRUDE PETROLEUM IN PENNSYLVANIA, WEST VIRGINIA AND SOUTH-EASTERN OHIO, QUANTITY AND VALUE OF OIL (REFINED REDUCED TO CRUDE EQUIVALENT) EXPORTED FROM THE UNITED STATES, WELLS COMPLETED, AND AVERAGE YEARLY PRICE OF REFINED AT NEW YORK, FROM SEPTEMBER 1ST, 1859, TO DECEMBER 31ST, 1896. ---------- If needs be, petroleum may well be defiant; The baby has grown to be earth’s greatest giant.