opinion: In re NICHOLS.
  No. 9580.
  Circuit Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.
  Aug. 5, 1940.
  Arthur H. Bartelt, of Austin, Tex., for petitioner.
  No other appearance was entered in the case, and no transcript of record was filed.
  Before FOSTER, SIBLEY, and HUTCHESON, Circuit Judges.
  PER CURIAM.
  This is a petition for leave to file an application for a writ of-prohibition directed to the Hon. James C. Wilson, Judge of the Northern District of Texas, Glenn Smith, referee in bankruptcy for the same district, and Walter A. Todd, trustee of the bankrupt estate of Harry W. Elliott. It appears the bankrupt surrendered as part of his estate his interests in a number of oil leases in the East Texas Oil Field. He had transferred his interests in these leases to two syndicates, had divided them into 150,000 separate parts and had sold them to the public at $10 per fractional part. Petitioners claim to own some 217 of these fractional “interests.” The referee issued an order to show cause why the assets should not be liquidated and the estate closed. Petitioners sought to intervene in the case, for themselves and all others similarly situated, to oppose the closing of the estate, contending that some producing wells had been brought in and the property should be turned over to the interest holders. No other interest holders joined them. Leave to intervene was denied and an appeal was taken to this court, where it is now pending and will be heard in due course. Whatever rights petitioners may have are protected by the appeal.
  On the authority of In re Cohen et al., 5 Cir., 107 F.2d 881, the petition is denied.
instruction: What follows is an opinion from a United States Court of Appeals.
  Intervenors who participated as parties at the courts of appeals should be counted as either appellants or respondents when it can be determined whose position they supported. For example, if there were two plaintiffs who lost in district court, appealed, and were joined by four intervenors who also asked the court of appeals to reverse the district court, the number of appellants should be coded as six.
  When coding the detailed nature of participants, use your personal knowledge about the participants, if you are completely confident of the accuracy of your knowledge, even if the specific information is not in the opinion. For example, if "IBM" is listed as the appellant it could be classified as "clearly national or international in scope" even if the opinion did not indicate the scope of the business. 
  
  Your task concerns the first listed appellant. The nature of this litigant falls into the category "private business (including criminal enterprises)", specifically "mining". Your task is to determine what subcategory of business best describes this litigant.
choices: oil and gas coal metals other  unclear