BAMBOO PULP AS PAPER MATERIAL 



347 



Under intelligent administration of tropical labor, especially under the 

 farming system, which is so successful a feature of the sugar-cane industry 

 in some of the West Indian islands, the raw material should not cost more 

 than |2 per long cord (approximately a ton), delivered at the mill, and the 

 total cost per ton of pulp at a factory turning out 1,000 tons per month 

 should not exceed f30 for a high-grade bleached pulp, worth, at an extremely 

 modest estimate, $50. 



To epitomize, the bamboo is the cheapest of all materials; the bisulphite 

 is the cheapest of all chemical processes, and the new method of bleaching 

 is much cheaper than any other method in present use. 



[Note. The search for paper pulp material to meet the great and growing 

 demand is of the greatest interest. The increasing scarcity and cost of spruce 

 has already led to successful experiments with other woods, formerly disre- 

 garded, but experimenters are continually looking for material which can be 

 grown more rapidly than trees. The foregoing article suggests a possible 

 promising source of supply, but it must be remembered that bamboo is a 

 tropical product and that our mills, representing an enormous investment, 

 are in the North. The utilization of bamboo on a large commercial scale would 

 involve a considerable readjustment of the pulp industry, and the solving 

 of many questions, among which that of labor would not be the least. It 

 can, therefore, hardly be regarded as a possibility of the immediate future, 

 although well worth consideration in connection with an ultimate supply. — 

 Editor.] 



