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THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[September 1, 1914. 



liiL j..,..L>t results if they had not fallen under the foot of the 

 ruthless conqueror. The assumption that the present natives 

 are descended from the builders of the temples and pyramids 

 is based upon the fact that from the beginning of history, with 

 the exception of the eastern United States and the West Indies, 

 no important native population has ever been subjected to 

 wholesale extermination or displacement. 



To thi"; people, peaceful, prosperous and happy, came wliiic 

 men, bearing the cross of Christianity and the l)anners of Spam. 

 .■\1<.. they brought whips, chains, firelirands and weapons of 



The N.\tion.al The.\ter, Gu.\tem.\l.\ City. 



death. The people succumbed like the sheep between the fangs 

 of the wolf. Their temples were desecrated, their libraries 

 burned, their lands and buildings were stolen, their chiefs and 

 teachers were burned at the stake and they themselves were 

 murdered or, whipped and manacled, set to work as slaves in the 

 fields which but yesterday were their own. Is it surprising that 

 after four hundred years of subjection and repression the de- 

 scendants of that people feel a trifle discouraged and un- 

 enterprising? 



But the Indian is no longer a slave and may, if he will, work 

 for himself. He is gradually waking up, but we must be patient 

 and give him time to rub his eyes. An observant traveler says 

 that when anything new is pressed upon the Indian he says that 

 his people have never used it and dismisses the question. When, 

 however, his neighbor adopts a new and improved article or 

 method, his own pride vifill not let him rest until he has done 

 as well. It is in the judicious cultivation of this trait that the 

 business missionary finds his greatest success. For instance, 

 there is in Guatemala an annual sale of several thousand dollars' 

 worth of mackintoshes, all of which are, or recently were, im- 

 ported from Great Britain and Germany. Certainly there ought 

 to be a thousand times as many rubber garments sold there and 

 they ought to come from the same nearby land as does the blue- 

 winged warbler. This is the way one visitor describes the rains 

 down there : "The raindrops are about as big as oranges and 

 of a peculiarly wet character; they come down at the rate of 

 about five thousand a minute and hit you everywhere at the same 

 time." That the natives are not sufficiently amphibious to relish 

 this daily meteorological experience is proved by a photograph 

 which the editor of The Indi.\ Rubber Worlo brought back a 

 few years ago from the Mexican state of Chiapas, which adjoins 

 Guatemala. It represented an Indian laborer wearing a native 

 rain-shed of cane fibre, which is the only kind used by the 

 poorer classes in that part of the world. It looks like a corn- 

 shock walkin.g around on two bare feet and surmounted by a 

 volcanic Mexican hat. 



The small but steady sale of mackintoshes in Guatemala proves 

 that they are appreciated by their wearers, who, no doubt, are 

 chiefly in the cities. If a salesman thoroughly conversant with 

 the customs alid language of the people should go through the 



rural districts during the rainy season and should hire persuasive 

 natives to furnish the object lesson and preach the evangel of 

 rubber rain-coats, beyond question a large and permanent trade 

 could be obtained. True, the laborers are poor, but this con- 

 dition is changing year by year and there could be no investment 

 that would yield proportionately greater comfort. 



The entire volume of the commerce between the United States 

 and Guatemala is still comprised within rather small figures. 

 Our imports from that country, of all kinds, for 1912, amounted 

 to $2,644,037 and in 1913 to $3,106,981, while our exports of all 

 kinds to that country during these tw-o years amounted to 

 $2,519,052 and $3,658,587. Our imports of rubber from Guatemala 

 in 1912 amounted to 166,443 pounds, valued at $85,936, while in 

 1913 the nunilier of pounds decreased slightly, being 133,230. but 

 the rubber was evidently a better quality, as its value amounted 

 to $91,190. Incidentally it might be added that Guatemala levies 

 an export duty on rubber shipped from that country of 1^ cents 

 (American gold) per pound, but the president of the republic 

 issued a decree on May 31 last suspending this export duty for a 

 period of six months, owing to the general fall in the price of 

 rubber. 



Our exports of rubber manufactured goods to Guatemala for 

 the last two years are shown in the following table : 



1912 1913 



Belting, packing and hose S6,179 $8,694 



Shoes — pairs 225 72 



value $318 $49 



Automobile tires 2,178 2,224 



Other tires 871 672 



Other rubber goods 2,612 5,393 



Total $12,158 $17,032 



It will be noticed from this table that our exports of rubber 

 manufactured goods increased in 1913 by about 40 per cent, over 

 the preceding year, but the items are really pitifully small. Think 

 of selling less than $9,000 worth of belting, paeking and hose 

 in a nearby country where there are magnificent forests of 

 mahogany and other cabinet woods which economically cut down 

 and converted into lumber would be a source of vast revenue. 

 .\nd there is the item of rubber shoe exports — 72 pairs during 

 the whole year, in a country where there are 2,000,000 pairs of 

 feet. The value of American tires sold in Guatemala, it will be 

 noticed, was less than $3,000 last year — just about tires enough 

 to supply 15 or 20 machines. 



The item "Other Rubber Goods." which includes all that great 

 class of articles known as druggists' sundries, amounted last 

 year to a little over $5,000; and yet there is one city alone — 

 Guatemala City — with a population close to 100.000 and with a 

 very considerable proportion of this number consisting of well- 

 to-do people who certainly ought to be inte»ested in the ordinary 

 comforts of life. It should be possible to sell there whatever it is 

 possible to sell in New Orleans and Galveston or, excepting a 

 few- articles adapted for cold climates, anything that can be sold 

 in any city in the United States. If the figures just given seem 

 small, they furnish at once a proof that the market is there and 

 that its exploitation has just begun. One curious item of trade 

 is that of elastic goring for the "Congress" style of shoes, of 

 which about $10,000 worth annually is imported into that 

 countr}\ Germany furnishes nearly all of it, the United States 

 figuring, if at all, in a very small way. 



The chief port of Guatemala is Puerto Barrios, on the Atlantic 

 Coast, which has more than half of the whole country's foreign 

 trade. On the Pacific side is San Jose, which handles more 

 than half the remainder, and Champerico, which, in turn, takes 

 more than half of what still remains. Livingston, on the Atlantic 

 and Ocos, on the Pacific, complete the list. 



Puerto Barrios has a railroad which runs to Guatemala City 

 in the interior and thence to the Pacific Coast, with the principal 

 towns of which it is connected. The hotels of the republic are 

 said to be very good as to food and fair otherwise, with verv' 



