366 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[August i, 1906. 



the shoreward end of tlie dock. The freight of eacli indi- 

 vidual consignee is kept by itself, and no piece is allowed to 

 be again handled until the entire cargo has been unloaded. 

 All this is done under the watchful eye of employes of the 

 steamship company, checking off, against the ship's "mani- 

 fest," the packages of each shipper. Wlien the ship is 

 "clear " the next operation is the weighing. 



The rubber cases are trucked out into a large open space 

 between the wharf and the warehouse, and (lroi)pe<i into 

 what, if it were not on private propertj-, would be called the 

 street. Here is set up a weighing device not unlike a huge 

 steelj'ard. A case of rubber is opened and the rubber taken 

 out and weighed. Then the case itself and everything that 

 went to make up the package, even to the iron strap and 

 the verj- last nail, are also placed on the steelyard. The 

 rubber is then carefully repacked and the bo.x marked with 

 the gross, tare, and net weights. 



The object of this weighing is to enable the consignee to 

 know just how much rubber he has received, and not as a 

 check upon the weighing done at the Brazilian ports, for it 

 must be understood that the rubber shrinks considerably on 

 the voj-age. Some of the larger importers employ- their 

 own weighers, and there are independent weighers at hand 

 for those who desire their services. The customs officials 

 are not concerned about the weighing. There is no import 

 duty on rubber, and Vncle Sam's statistics of imports of 

 this commodity are based upon the ship's manifest. 



When the box has been weighed and marked it is ready 

 for its final disposition, so far as the importer is concerned. 

 The steamship company is through with it. and so are the 

 customs inspectors. If the destination of the rubber is Bos- 

 ton or Providence, it maj- be lightered to a steamboat 

 running to one of those cities, or it may be loaded onto a 

 freight car standing on the spur railroad track that runs 

 through the yard. It may be loaded onto a truck and 

 carted to the consignee's own storehouse, or it may be sent 

 acioss the street to the bonded warehouse to be stored until 

 it is wanted. If the consignee for c^ny reason is not pre- 

 pared to move his stuff, he may leave it on the dock for six 

 days, storage being charged from the date of the actual 

 warehousing. 



Sometimes no part of a consignment is sent to the ware- 

 house, because it was sold before it arrived, or the importer 

 knows where it can be sent immediately to advantage. If 

 it goes to the warehouse it must be reweighed when it is 

 taken out, for even the best rubber is susceptible to shrink- 

 age, and no buyer cares to pay Si or more per pound for 

 more rubber than he actually gets. 



All the rubber received at New York of course does not 

 arrive by the steamers from the Amazon. Rubber is 

 brought in nearly all the important transatlantic steamers, 

 and in the smaller boats arriving from Central and South 

 American ports ; there are almost daily arrivals, forming a 

 comparatively unimportant part of the cargo, which is 

 handled from the piers of the different lines in the same way 

 as other cargo. It comes in cases, bales, ca.sks, bags — a 

 most miscellaneous collection it would make if it could all 

 be brought together. In weighing some classes of rubber 

 the weight of the wrapping as forwarded by the shipper is 

 accepted, and deducted from the weight of tlie package as it 

 is received. The remainder is the weight of the rubber. 



I^ast \-ear 35 steamers arrived from Para (most of them 



having touched also at Manaos) with important cargoes of 

 rubber. Four steamers in a single month brought an aver- 

 age of more than 2,000,000 pounds of rubber each, for which 

 the consumers paid probably as many dollars, .so it will be 

 seen that tlie cargoes from the Amazon are of great value. 

 There are dull seasons in this trade, however, and at times 

 the Para steamers carry less rubber than of other commodi- 

 ties. A recent arrival was a steamer with a comparatively 

 small amount of rubber, but with 600 tons of Brazil nuts, 

 poured loose into the hold. Para rubber reaching New 

 York is taken by a small number of houses, devoted espe- 

 cially to importing rubber. On the manifest, however, rub- 

 ber frequently appears consigned to banking institutions, 

 just as happens in the case of the import trade general!}- — a 

 feature of the financing of large shipments. Likewise a 

 rubber house may have consigned to it a cargo of nuts or 

 skins or feathers, but this does not indicate that the house 

 is taking on a new department of business. Merchants in 

 the Amazon region make remittances in the form most con- 

 venient, and it may be in the form of feathers. 



WHENCE THE RESIN IN RUBBER.? 



'T^O THE Editor ok The Indi.\ Rubber World: The 

 -^ plantation rubber cured bj' the process described by me 

 in a recent number of The Indi.\ Rvbher World [March i, 

 1906 — page iSS] was found bj- the factory, which purchased 

 it, to contain a large percentage of resinous matter, though 

 not as much as rubber cured on a neighboring plantation 

 from trees of the same age by evaporation or absorbtion 

 only. 



Further study leads me to believe that planters have been 

 misled by the demand of manufacturers for a perfectlj- dry 

 rubber. To drj' perfect!}', one must make rubber into very 

 thin sheets, pancakes, or crepe. Complaint is made of all 

 these, whether they be of Cas/illoa or Para, and the reason 

 would seem to be resin. Whence the resin? That is a 

 question I wish manufacturers and planters would set 

 themselves to answer at once. It will take the planter 

 alone years to answer, because he is not a chemist. If the 

 manufacturer will help, it will take weeks only. 



I submit for consideration my view, based on a planter's 

 observation. Resin or the most of it seems to be due to 

 drying and exposure. Caslitloa, the core of a ball of the 

 finest Para, and the best Congo, cut thin and thrown into a 

 drawer for a few months, became almost equally gummy 

 any pasty, a state which I assume to indicate resin. 

 Castilloa, if kept long enough, will run down from the shelf, 

 here, like tar. The white core (that is to say, the part not 

 completely dried) of a thick piece of plantation Castilloa 

 answers all the visual and tactual tests of the best Para, 

 while the drj- skin is short and tacky, the more the older. 

 What takes place ? Is it due to oxygen, light, or bacteria ? 

 Will some one make tests of the white hermeticall}- sealed 

 core and the black rim of a ball of Para, of white quen plan- 

 tation Cas/illoa, and thin, stick}- pancakes or sheets of the 

 same of crSpe, of rubber milk, etc.? 



If the resin does not come out of the tree, the planter will 

 know what to do and the manufacturer will doubtless reform 

 his method of drying by exposing for weeks or months thin 

 sheets of mangled rubber. Gordon waldrox. 



Biuefield's, Nicaragua. June 14. 1906. 



