270 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



IJl-ne 1, 1907. 



Xati\i-:s Dki.iveking Ruiibkk at a I'ost of the Cik. du Kasai. 



ness and fairness. In Europe the trader, wliatever he may have 

 to sell, secures customers by studying their tastes and require- 

 ments, and by trying to give them satisfaction. "In the Congo 

 the native has scarcely any wants ; he would prefer never to have 

 any; v\hat we must do is to create wants. To create wants is the 

 diflicult task which reciuires a minute knowledge of the native's 

 nature, his weakness, his customs, habits and language." 



In a region not yet opened in any sense to trade the work of 

 finding out its resources and the possibilities for trading must 

 be carried on by tactful and peaceable exploration by experienced 

 agents. The white man is looked upon with suspicion, and the 

 penetration for the first time of the native districts may be even 

 dangerous. What is necessary as a foundation of business is to 

 induce the natives to work — say at getting out rubber — by the 

 allurement of wealth, which, at the outset they pretend they can 

 do without, as idleness is, in their eyes, the acme of happiness. 



But to try to deal with the natives singly would require a vast 

 deal of time. The white mau addresses himself to a chief. His 

 belongings are shown to the best advantage — his bed, blanket?, 

 boxes, tools, cooking utensils, knives and the like, which niu-t 

 be carried by the commercial agent for his own use, togetlier 

 with cloths or ornaments chosen to attract the eye of the natives. 

 The chief has the advantage that if he lacks the means where- 

 with to buy. he can obtain it by directing his people to go to 

 work. If the chief is led to desire blankets, for example, lie 

 learns that so much rubber, which his people can soon learn to 

 prepare, will secure them, and thus is laid the foundation for 

 trade relations. To maintain and extend these absolute fairness 

 in trading is essential. 



It is not always easy to agree with the native in fixing the price 

 in rubber of the various articles submitted to him. Such matters 

 cannot be settled arbitrarily. "Every article nnist be valued not 

 according to what it costs us in Europe, not according to its co'.,t 

 price in Africa, but according to the value which it has in the 

 eyes of the natives so as to please them. It happens that dift'er- 

 ent articles which vary greatly in size and weight and which 

 therefore incur a very unequal cost of carriage, represent the 

 same or practically the same value to us out in Africa." Thus 

 in the eyes of the natives a shirt or two pounds of salt might 

 represent three hens; a fez or a hat, one hen; and two yards of 

 cloth, two hens. Here are three different valuations for classes 

 of goods which have cost the trader the same price. The ad- 

 ministration in Europe which sends out goods for sale may insi^^t 

 upon having certain definite returns ; the agents on the spot. 

 studying conditions, proceed thus: They sell some articles, which 

 are not much valued at home, at a price surpassing the fixed 

 limit, and sell others which are valued higher at home but are 

 less desired by the natives, at a price which establishes a just 

 proportion in the eyes of the administration. 



All of which leads up to the question of the prices paid to the 

 natives for rubber. Mr. Ilarroy told his audience: "But it ought 

 not to be said : 'You only pay a trifling amount for your rub- 

 ber' ; this is not true. No one can tell without being on the spot 

 what is the real price paid to the native." 

 * * * 



In time trade may expand in such a district as is referred to 

 above until the natives generally will desire to obtain goods from 

 the stations and be found willing to work to acquire them. A 

 third picture in this connection represents the reception of ruii- 

 ber from native gatherers at a trading post of the Compagnie du 

 Kasai, who have now been engaged in business in the Kasai 

 basin for a number of years and are among the principal col- 

 lectors of rubber in the Congo Free State. 



A CONGO "ROOT RUBBER" PLANT. 



A N increasing interest is being displayed in the "root rubber" 

 ^» species in the Kwango district of the Congo Free State, 

 especially since the formation of the American Congo Co., whose 

 concession is understood to embrace an abundant supply of the 

 plant known as Landolphia Tholtonii, wh'ch was illustrated and 

 described in The India Rubber World May i, 1903 (page 261). 



A correspondent of The India Rubber World writing from 

 Kinshasa sends some specimens of rubber prepared by natives 

 of the Kwango district — adjacent to the concession of the ."Kmeri- 

 can Congo Co. — by methods of their own, and it is good rubber. 

 Our correspondent has analyzed similar specimens with this re- 

 sult : "Rubber, 89 per cent. ; resins, 6 ; ash, i ; vegetable matter, 

 4 per cent." The American company now becoming interested on 

 the Congo purposes applying to the roots of the Landoll>hia Thol- 

 lonii the same methods of extracting rubber that have been 

 worked successfully with the guayule plant in Mexico. 



Our African correspondent mentions at least two other plants 

 in the Kwango region resembling that named above, and likely 

 to be mistaken for it. One is the Landolphia humilis, described 

 as an indifferent rubber producer; the other is entirely worth- 

 less. The illustration shows roots of the Landolphia Thollonii 

 with the leaves and fruit; also, at the bottom of the picture, on 

 the left and right, leaves of the two other plants. 



An interesting report comes from Mexico regarding experi- 

 ments made with the bagasse which results from the extraction 

 of rubber from guayule shrubs, with a view to its use for fuel. 

 They have been carried on by a chemist of the Continental Rub- 

 ber Co. at Torreon. At present one-half of the fuel used at the 

 company's extraction plant there is refuse from the guayule 

 shrubs worked up, and it is now being considered whether the 

 refuse in question can be an absolute substitute for coal, which 

 is very expensive in that region. 



Congo "Root Rubber" Plants. 

 [The distance between the two points on the scale is 18 inches.] 



