During a century or more, hydrocarbon gases have issued from the soil in a district east of Itabo, in the Province of Matanzas. In 1880, Manuel Cueto had a well drilled on the Montembo Farm in this district. He finally discovered at a depth of 95 meters a deposit of remarkably pure naphtha which yielded about 25 gallons a day. It was a colorless, transparent, liquid, very inflammable, and leaving no perceptible residue after combustion. Cueto afterwards opened another well to a depth of 248 meters and there discovered a deposit of naphtha that produced 250 gallons per day. According to T. Wayland Vaughn of the United States Geological Service such gases are plentiful in the surrounding hills. In June, 1893, commercial agents of the United States Government reported that petroleum had been found near Cardenas of a grade much better than the crude oils imported from the United States. In November, 1894, another commercial agent from Washington reported that asphalt deposits near the city of Cardenas could produce from a thousand to five thousand tons of this material a year. In 1901 Herbert R. Peckham, describing asphalt fields east and south of Cardenas, mentions the drilling of a well by Lucas Alvarez, in search of petroleum, which he found at a depth of 500 feet, and from which he pumped 1000 gallons of petroleum, but this exhausted the supply of the well. As a result of investigations made by Mr. Peckham, seepages of crude oil and liquid asphalt of varying density may be found here over a district measuring about 4,500 square miles. Near the city of Santa Clara there is a petroleum field known as the Sandalina, samples of which were analyzed by H. M. Stokes in 1890, which he reported to be quite similar to the crude petroleum of Russia. In the neighborhood of Sagua and Caibarien, in the northern part of Santa Clara Province, petroleum fields have recently been discovered, and others in the southern part of the Province of Matanzas. Large deposits of asphalt, of varying grades and densities, have been found at intervals along the north coast of the Province of Pinar del Rio. From the harbor of Mariel a narrow gauge road has been built back to mines some six miles distant, over which, up to the beginning of the European War, asphalt was brought to the waterside and loaded directly into sailing vessels, bound for the United States and Europe. Other deposits have been found at La Esperanza and Cayo Jabos, a little further west along the same coast, and in the estimation of some well informed engineers this Pinar del Rio coast furnishes the most promising field for petroleum prospecting of all in Cuba.