348 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[July i, 1909. 



SAN ANTONIO— HEAD OF STEAM NAVIGATION ON THE RIVER MADEIRA, BRAZIL. 



[Here tlie steamers take on the Bolivian rubber floated over the falls of the Madeira. The Madeira-Mamore railway now being constructed is 



designed to convey such freight around the falls to San .\ntonio. ] 



In good years fortunes are made under this system, but the 

 risk involved is so great as to justify locally the scale of profits 

 quoted. But even in the worst years rubber continues to come 

 down the Amazon, and every year sees its procession of retired 

 rubber traders going to Europe. But the seringueiro remains on 

 the ground, caring not for Europe, or what rubber is used for, 

 but content only with the supplying of his small daily wants, 

 with no idea that he will ever be free from debt to his partner — 

 the man who runs the seringa!. For, as I have said, the serin- 

 gueiro is not a hired laborer. He gathers rubber in cstradas 

 owned by a capitalist and is paid with merchandise from the 

 capitalist's store. In times of high prices the laborer may become 

 extravagant ; when prices drop his credit at the store is limited. 



It is not to be wondered at that in many cases a seringal 

 becomes the property of an aviador who has provisioned it. In 



fact, perhaps most of the better rubber properties are now thus 

 owned. In the event of the new syndicate law becoming effective, 

 the ai iadores of Para might enter the list of exporters, since 

 they are "owners" of rubber properties within the meaning of the 

 law. These merchants own not only all the seringaes on certain 

 rivers, in addition to stores in the principal towns, but also 

 steamers and launches which, if assembled, would make a 

 formidable fleet. This new regime means a gradual consolidation 

 of rubber properties, the effect of which will be accentuated in 

 time by the existence of the new banking facilities already 

 mentioned. 



Rubber in the F.\r E.iiSt. 



And now about the competition of Ceylon and the Malay 

 States as producers of rubber of a type produced in the past 



A SERINGAL ON THE RIX'ER JURUA, IN BRAZIL. 

 [The buildings are mounted upon posts high enough to protect their occupants in the season of the overflow of the river.] 



