MINES OF WAX | AdventAI

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · May 13, 1903

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 29, No. 19.

MINES OF WAX.

In several parts of the world a resinous substance called ozocerite, and bearing considerable resemblance to beeswax, is found, usually in connection with rock salt and coal. There are deposits in Austria, Russia, Rumania, Egypt, Algeria, Canada and Mexico, but ozocerite has, so far, not been discovered in sufficient quantities to pay for mining anywhere except in the district of Boryslav, in Austrian Galicia, and on an island on the west coast of the Caspian Sea.

In mining this mineral wax, shafts are sunk until a bed or “nest” of ozocerite is struck. Then connecting galleries are driven. There is considerable danger, and many lives have been lost in consequence of the sudden forcing up of the soft wax into the shafts by the enormous pressure to which it is subjected. It is used largely for manufacturing ceresin, which is employed, together with beeswax, for making wax candles, as well as in the manufacture of phonographic cylinders, and for many similar purposes.