Page:The Mexican Problem (1917).djvu/67

Rh between the Carranza government in control at Tampico and the oil interests, more than a dozen American companies cooperating to advance the money, the same to be repaid from taxes on a part of the increase of their business. Under this arrangement the Mexican Eagle Company, Lord Cowdray's company, advances twenty-five per cent and the Mexican Petroleum Company thirty-three and one-third per cent.

The first oil developments began at Ebano, thirty-five miles west on the railroad from Tampico. Here the Mexican Petroleum Company has now 450,000 acres bounded on the north by the Tamesin River, and reaching almost down to the Panuco River, the general direction of which is parallel with the Tamesin River. Here is the heaviest oil, while as one goes south the oil is lighter and increases in commercial value.

Ebano is one of the most picturesque towns in Mexico, an American creation, of Mexican architecture, covering a beautiful mound rising nearly two hundred feet above the plain, now a fertile ranch, the whole reminding one of the beautiful Italian villages set on a hill; but ranch and hill were seventeen years ago a jungle