ON THE COMMERCIAL KINDS OF INDIA-RUBBER. 13 
and drag it over them by sheer main force. At last, when arrived at 
their goal, their first object is to build a hut to live in, beds being 
made of sticks, and on stages a few feet above ground. A work- 
shop is also built, if possible, as close as practicable to a river, 
a great quantity of water being required in the manufacture of the 
rubber. After an early breakfast, the men go to work, each man 
carrying a machete, a tin can capable of holding five gallons, and one 
or two wooden pails. As soon as the Ulero has selected his tree, he 
clears the surrounding ground of underwood and the stem of vines and 
epiphytieal plants, and makes a ladder by tying pieces of cane two feet 
long to some of the tough vines about an inch and a half in diameter 
hanging from the tree. All this preliminary work gone through, the 
Ulero cuts diagonal channels in the bark of the tree, first from his 
right side, then from his left, so that both meet in the middle. At 
the bottom of the lowest channel an iron spout, about four inches long 
and two inches broad, is driven, underneath which a pail is put. By 
the time he has done cutting channels he has to hurry down, his 
pail being now quite full, and has to be emptied into the larger 
vessels, in which it is carried to the workshop. A tree 4 feet in diameter 
and 20 to 30 feet to the first branches will yield 20 gallons of milk, 
each gallon producing 2 lbs., and if rich, 2 lbs. 2 oz. of good dried 
rubber. A good working man is able to get from ten to twenty-five 
gallons of milk a day.* In the evening the milk is pressed through 
a wire sieve, so that all the impurities are excluded, before it is put into 
the barrels. When the barrels are full, the real manufacture of the 
rubber commences. This is generally intrusted to the most skilful of the 
party. The best manner of converting the milk into rubber is by mixing 
with it the juice of a certain vine, termed ‘ Achuca’ by the natives, which 
has the singular property of coagulating it within the space of five 
minutes. This vine generally abounds in the woods, and has fine 
large white flowers. Bundles of it are collected, and each stick well 
beaten with a piece of wood, and soaked in water, which is strained 
through a cloth, and about a pint of it is well mixed with every 
* By roaming through these now uninhabited forests, the Uleros occa- 
dcnaliy come across remnants of a race of men now extinct; only permai 
they found a group of twelve well p 
placed in a circle around a high-place 
From description given me, eL must be some Apocynea.—BERTHOLD 
