26l 



commenced. In the first place all the standing trees — 1285 — were 

 numbered serially, and a record of their condition compiled. From 

 this record we learn that the standing trees which had been tapped 

 were 234; therefore at least sixteen had died in the last year. And 

 from the same useful record we learn which trees were of 1877 and 

 some of other years. 



Under Mr. Ridley, Mr. Derry now set out "to experiment on the 

 .... trees planted in 1886, 1887 and 1888" {Agricultural Bulletin of 

 the Straits and F.M.S., iii., 1904, p. 332), having before him a series of 

 objects, one being for instance to ascertain in what part of the day 

 tapping should be performed; another to demonstrate how incision 

 after the Brasilian method is inferior to excision ; a third to enquire 

 into the relative value of distributing lines of excised cuts over 

 the bark against making a single excised line, and so on. With the 

 results on latex, we are not here so much concerned as with the 

 amount of cutting that the experiments involved and the way in 

 which it was done. By the end of 1904 Mr. Derry had tapped 850 

 trees. 



Four reports were published on the experiments of the year. 

 The first was over Mr. Derry's name and appeared in the September 

 number of the Agricultural Bulletin of the Straits and F.M.S., wheie 

 despite the month given on the cover of the part, it carried the 

 record of tapping into October; the second appeared as a continua- 

 tion of the first in the November number of the Bulletin and 

 prolonged the record to the middle of that month, and the third in 

 the April and May, 1905, numbers ; the fourth under the joint names 

 of Messrs. Ridley and Derry was a Report to Government, dated 7th. 

 November, 1905, which was printed separately and also in the 

 Agricultural Bidletin of the Straits and F.M.S., for November, 1905, 

 vol. iv., 1905, p. 424. From the prefatory remarks to the last cited 

 it is learned that tapping was done in March, April, May and June, 

 but that this was not altogether satisfactory, so the recorded experi- 

 ments actually were dated from July 4th. 



Experiment I of 1904, had for its first object the ascertaining 

 of the time of day — morning or evening — at which trees should be 

 tapped; and it had as a second object the comparison of M. 

 Bonnechaux's Brasilian method with excision along oblique cuts. 

 Instead of the small axe after the Brasilian model which had been 

 made for M. Bonnechaux, a half-inch carpenter's chisel was used ; the 

 cuts were distributed all over the lower part of the trunk of the 

 trees set aside for the purposes. Ten cuts were made per diem. 

 The same implement was used for making the oblique cuts on the 

 trees of the contrasting part of the experiment. The tapping of 

 these trees was by superposed converging or diverging cuts — the cuts 

 in two series not near enough to make Vs or inverted Vs ; in some 

 of the trees the cuts converged downwards and in others diverged 

 downwards. In a comment Mr. Derry described the design as " a 

 herring-bone without a central channel ; " but the description is 



