As a result of the petroleum excitement, brought about by reports of surface indications and of the success of the Union Oil Company’s drillings, many claims have been registered for both asphalt and petroleum within recent years. Up to the last day of December, 1917, 215 claims were filed in the Bureau of Mines, covering an area of about 25,000 acres. In the same time 88 claims, scattered throughout the various Provinces, were registered for oil, comprising a total area of about 40,000 acres. This scramble for oil lands has resulted in the formation of some fifty different companies, most of which have issued large amounts of stock, and many of which will properly come under the head of “wildcat” adventures. This, however, has happened in other countries under similar circumstances; notably in the United States. In the fall of 1918 some 15 companies were drilling for oil, most of which yielded very little results. This was due in some instances to inadequate machinery, and in others to inefficient workmen, together with absolute lack of any definite knowledge of the district in which they were working. In addition to this, nearly all of the wells drilled have either found oil or stopped at a depth of 1000 feet. In only a few instances have wells been sunk to a depth of 3000 feet, and most of these were in a section where almost nothing was known of the geology of the country. In Sabanilla de la Palma, the Cuban Oil and Mining Corporation drilled to a depth of 1036 feet. On reaching the 120-foot level, they penetrated a layer of asphalt four feet in thickness, and found petroleum in small quantities at two other levels. At 1037 feet they met petroleum of a higher grade, and are planning to sink the well to a depth of 4000 feet with the idea of finding still richer deposits. About two kilometers west of Caimito de Guayabal, near the western boundary of Havana Province, Shaler Williams has drilled several wells, one to a depth of 1800 feet, which produced oil and gas, but in small quantities. The gas has furnished him light and power on his farm for several years.