M. SEEMANN’S JOURNAL. 87 
^ «de 
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dens, as a curiosity, a plant or two, but they grow very slowly. It must | 
ever be an object of regret, that on the first introduction of the Taban 
Gum its proper name was not promulgated. Now everybody in Europe 
and America speaks of Gutta Percha, when, in fact, all the time they | 
mean the Gutta Taban. The substance termed by the Malays “ Gutta | 
Percha" is not the produce of the Zsonandra Gutta, Hook., but that 
of a botanically unknown tree, a species of Ficus, I am told. The 
confusion of these two names has become a popular error—an error | 
which science will have to rectify. | 
The exportation of the indigenous Gutta Taban from Singapore | 
commenced in 1844, but as early as the end of 1847 all, or at least 
most, of the trees had been exterminated. That at present shipped 
from the place is brought in coasting vessels from the different ports 
of Borneo, Sumatra, the Malayan peninsula, and Jahore Archipelago*. 
The difference existing in its appearance and property is owing to the 
intermixture of Gutta Percha, J elotong, Gegrek, Litchu, and other 
inferior Guttas, made by the natives in order to increase the weight. 
Though far from being extinct in the Indian Archipelago, Gutta Taban 
will every year be more difficult to obtain, as the coast region is said 
to be pretty well cleared, and a long transport from the interior must, 
by augmenting the labour, increase the value of the article. 
A few months after the publication of your first account of the 
plant, in January, 1847, an article on the same subject appeared in 
the ‘Journal of the Indian Archipelago,’ by one of its most able con- 
tributors, Dr. T. Oxley. As that article contains many statements not | 
contained in yours, and as it may possibly have escaped your notice, | 
I shall make a few extracts from it. | + 
* “The total export of Gutta Taban from Singapore has been :— - 
se arn dis gi ee FN M Iv rg ren re 
nn " 
In 1844 in 1 pieul. 
DM 95 SS 9. 
I1M6 ; . 2. s... Gd adt ess 
DABI x 09 naf 68.2) uim NS o 
In 1848 to the Ist of July . . . . . 6,768 ,, 
Total -~ . +, 21,598 piculs, valued at - 
274,190 Spanish dollars. About 270,000 trees have probably been felled during the 
three and a half years that the trade has existed, and the value of ‘each tree has thus 
on an average been ábout a dollar.”—J. R. Logan, * On the Range of the Gutta 
Taban Collectors, and present Amount of Import into Singapore.'—Mr. Logan has 
promised an article on the various substances intermixed with the Taban, a subject 
of the highest interest ; but he has hitherto disappointed his readers. 
