275 



about l6 to 20 oz., in weight, and the other in balls of rubber 

 threads each weighing I2 to l6 oz. The price paid (in 1869) for 

 the two kinds varied, he says, from 8 rupees to 12 rupees, but this 

 was paid for by pieces of Eri silk cloth of that value in exchange 

 for a maund of rubber. This fetched in Calcutta from 20 rupees 

 to 40 rupeees per maund, but Mr. Mann adds " if care were 

 bestowed on the manufacture, it beyond doubt would fetch much 

 higher prices." Messrs. Martin Ritchie & Co., however, purchased 

 their rubber only in the fluid state from the people who tapped the 

 trees. It was brought to them either in earthen pots or cane 

 baskets made water proof with a previous coating of rubber. This 

 coating of rubber, Mr. Mann states, was held to retain the sap in 

 its fluid state. He goes on to say that, rubber in this fluid state 

 was first purchased at 1-8 rupees per maund, but soon rose to 5 

 rupees for the best or thickest procured from the aerial roots, and 

 4 rupees for the next best procured from the lower part of the 

 stem, and 3 rupees for the worst supposed to come from the upper 

 branches of the tree and to have been mixed with the juice of 

 other species of Fig and water. 



A full grown rubber tree of about 50 years old will yield at the 

 very lowest 10 lbs. of rubber, if very carefully tapped, and this 

 quantity may be expected about 16 times, which will be an equally 

 safe estimate for calculating the yield of a rubber tree. To be 

 quite on the safe side, calculate 10 trees per acre which would 

 give about I,600 lbs. of rubber from every acre. This, at the price 

 at which rubber was collected in the Darrang district and sold, 

 and deducting the expenditure incurred in collecting it, would give 

 a net profit of 54 rupees per 80 lbs., or l,o8o rupees per acre in 

 SO years, and if the rubber trees have a longer life, the yield may 

 be reckoned for their remaining years of life at the same, if not a 

 higher rate. 



Colh'ctioit — Among forest trees and in regard to dimensions, 

 this is facile princeps and there is no other, not even the Banyan 

 that approaches it in dimensions and grandeur. Mr. C. Brownlow 

 points out that every portion below the head of the foster tree is 

 strictly root and incapable of throwing out a branch, and as the 

 head is rarely less than 60 to lOO feet high, it is no easy matter 

 to procure a branch. These cables and buttresses as they approach 

 the ground, throw out smaller and subsidiary rootlets of all thick- 

 nesses down to that of twine. If any of these be cut they die below, 

 but from above grow again downwards. It is only necessary to 

 see the tree to appreciate the fearful risk encountered by the gum 

 gatherers, who by no means confine their operations to the base, but 

 climb up as high as the roots extend, and higher along the hori- 

 zontal branches, chopping at intervals of every few inches, the 

 cuts answering as well for their foothold as for the sap to exude 

 from. Were the base of the tree alone tapped, the yield would be 

 very insignificant, especially in trees that have been frequently 

 tapped before. And as the trees occur very sparsely, and long 

 distances have to be gone over to meet them, it becomes an object 

 to get as much off at each cutting as possible. The trees must be 



