AMAZING INCREASE IN CONSUMPTION Fears of the United States The consumption of oil is rising at a terrific rate. Entire branches of industry are transformed, and it may be said that all modern transport is increasingly dependent upon the use of the new fuel. Automobilism and aviation owe their existence to it. Not only do steam engines tend to give place to the oil motor in a great number of cases, but they themselves begin to use oil instead of coal. Locomotives and the engines of ships more and more seek the source of their energy in oil. No more smoke, no more troublesome ash, and double the calorific power. The work of a fireman, formerly so exhausting, is reduced to the opening and closing of a tap. If coal is replaced by mazut in the furnaces of ships, their radius of action is increased by 50 per cent.; it is more than tripled if the internal-combustion engine is used. Certain British engineers are not afraid to assert that _one ton of mazut, used in a Diesel engine for ships, is equivalent to at least six tons of coal_. Few countries hesitate in face of such advantages. Since 1885 the railways of Southern Russia have been run on oil; those of Rumania since 1887. The railway companies of the United States consumed 20 million barrels even in 1909--that is, _one-tenth_ of the production at that time. And the last few years have been marked by the conclusion of contracts by the United States Railroad Administration for the delivery of 50 million barrels. The engines of the Southern Pacific Railway have been aptly described as veritable monsters. Their boilers are two metres in diameter and fourteen and a half metres long. Their heating-surface is double that of ordinary locomotives. The driver's place is in front, which allows him to see the track. Mexico has long since followed the example set by the United States. So also has Austria for her Alpine railways. France has made experiments which have been much talked of; and the Argentine, only a few months ago, has concluded important contracts with the _Shell Transport and Trading Company_ for the supply of oil for her railways. Everywhere the substitution of oil for coal is going on, and consumption is developing with such rapidity that the supply is no longer anything like equal to the demand. Even if Russia recovered, the discrepancy between the needs of the world and the quantity available would be considerable. That is why the price of liquid fuel, which requires little labour in its production, remains so high. Since North America supplies 80 per cent. of the world production, the dollar has become the standard currency for oil. At the present time, Rumanian oil, delivered in Hungary, is sold at the same price as American oil. _The market-price is therefore fixed for the whole world by New York._