226 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[Apkil 1, 1911. 



awe and approval. The orchestra consisted of a tom-tom, a 

 triangle, and a sort of a metallic xylophone. We were received 

 most respectfully, chairs being brought in and a special dance 

 being arranged for us. The dancing girl, who in the native 

 eyes was a great beauty and a wonderful dancer, sat near us 

 chewing betelnut and expectorating as profusely as any tobacco 

 chewing American. Her dance consisted of a slow rhythmic walk 

 intermingled with lan^id postures and graceful movements of 



AUTOMOBILE TIRES FOR THE TROPICS. 



Pole Bridge on Pl.\ntation. 



the hands and arms. The one interesting thing about her was 

 the accentuated expression of immobile haughtiness without 

 which no Javanese danseuse can be considered beautiful. There 

 was also an absurd Httle Javanese clown, dressed to imitate 

 the Javanese idea of a Scotch highlander, whose antics provoked 

 shrieks of laughter from the women and children. 



At intervals between the dances a sash rolled in the form of a 

 turban was presented to each visitor for drink money. .After 



M.WS C.\NAL, VOORBURG. 



the clown and the ballet dancer, whom our host called the 

 "Balata Dancer," had finished, the giver of the Fetish treated 

 us to cigars and invited us to remain until the festival was 

 over. As this would mean a matter of three days' stay in the 

 balata sheds, we were compelled to decline. Instead we went 

 out on the pier, where it was cool, and were served a most de- 

 lightful after theater supper. 



[TO BE CONTINUED. 1 



IF any manufacturer of automobile tires will erect in his fac- 

 tory yard a small house, steam-heated, so that the tempera- 

 ture may be kept at about 90 degs. Fahr. during the day and 70 

 dcgs. through the night; if he will further see that the con- 

 fined air ill the building is kept moist almost to saturation; if 

 he will provide windows so that, the midday sun may raise the 

 temperature say to 150 degs., and its light search every part of 

 the interior, he will have a very fair imitation of the climatic 

 condition his tires endure in the tropics. 



His testing machines set up in such a room will develop start- 

 ling facts. Perhaps the first to be noted will be that wherever 

 rubber in solution has been used, it will soften and "let go" no 

 matter how complete the vulcanization. Treads that are tough 

 in the temperate zone are apt to get waxy and soft in the torrid; 

 fabrics thought to be moisture proof, mildew and rot. All of 

 which argues the need for a special tire for the tropics. 



It would also seem to be worth while, for the market is a 

 promising one. England, with her thousands of miles of fine 

 roads in Ceylon, India, the Federated Malay States, Jamaica, 

 Barbados, etc., not to speak of the German, French and Belgian 

 tropical possessions, together with the large Centra! and South 

 American cities, make a market for automobiles that is rapidly 

 being exploited — one that calls for an increasingly large number 

 of tires. . 



"NEAR" RUBBER FROM THE SOYA BEAN. 



REFERENCE is made elsewhere in the columns of this 

 paper to a recently granted German patent on a process 

 tor the manufacture, from the soya bean, of a substitute to take 

 the place of rubber. 



Considering the high price that consumers are willing to pay 

 for the raw product, compared with the cost of its production, 

 and the constantly increasing — practically unlimited — demand for 

 rubber for a thousand and one purposes, it must be admitted 

 that the field is an alluring one. That a fortune awaits the in- 

 ventor of any substitute for india-rubber that can be produced 

 at anything like reasonable cost and from a material so cheap 

 and easily obtainable as the soya bean, for instance, is taking 

 a very conservative view of the situation. When we consider 

 that the price of the raw rubber our manufacturers use in such 

 vast quantities constantly dallies around two dollars per 

 pound, it will be evident that there is a wide margin 

 for profit above any likely cost of production and if we can 

 subtract raw material for our rubber factories, even from a 

 staple article of Oriental diet like the soya bean, there will be 

 money enough in the undertaking to furnish the Mongolian 

 population with a more toothsome and no less nutritious substi- 

 tute for a food product that is relegated, in the Western world, 

 to the rank of a source of vegetable oil and a cattle feed. 



GEKMAN BALATA BELTING FOR THE UNITED STATES. 



In a recent report, the United States consul general at Dilling- 

 ham, Coburg, Germany, states that during the last fiscal year, 

 there was an increase, amounting to 32 per cent, in the ship- 

 ments of balata belting from his district to the United States, 

 all of which were made by one factory in Thuringia. These ship- 

 ments, the consul remarks, will probably cease entirely in the 

 course of the present year because a factory is being erected in 

 the United States by this same Thurnigian firm, for the manu- 

 facture there of balata belting; the machinery for it has already 

 been shipped to America. The consul quotes the value of the 

 balata belting shipped to the United States from his consular 

 district, during 1910, as $115,747, compared with $87,585 in 1909. 



Send for Index (free) to Mr. Pearson's "Crude Rubber and 

 Compounding Ingredients." 



