INDIAN RUBBER TREE. 95 



facility, and drink from out the cups formed among 

 the branches. Communities of little bustling crea- 

 tures, the comajen or wood louse, often fix their 

 habitations on the trunk, where, like a Chinese 

 population, they seem almost innumerable. The 

 slippery bark, which offers an impediment to even 

 the swiftest climber, presents no obstacle to them. 

 Carrying pellets of earth in their mouths, and 

 attaching them, most probably, to the bark, by 

 means of some glutinous exudation, they rapidly 

 erect their city; and from this they form several 

 covered ways to the ground. One is evidently in- 

 tended to shelter the inhabitants in going down, 

 another in coming up ; if the community is very 

 large, several are erected; but if small, two suffice 

 for every necessary purpose. 



Guiana also is the country of the Indian rubber 

 tree, or caoutchouc, which grows, in company 

 with the teak tree, within twenty degrees north 

 and south of the equator. The nature and the 

 properties of its valuable juice have recently been 

 much examined by scientific men. They have 

 succeeded in discovering that it is slightly analo- 

 gous to silk; and that every plant which nourishes 

 the silk worm, contains a larger or smaller quan- 

 tity of caoutchouc ; such as the lettuce, the dan- 

 delion, and the mulberry. We also learn 

 from a recent traveller in the Brazils, the 

 interesting fact, that, wherever the caoutchouc 

 abounds, large moths, at least two or three inches 

 in length, are known to produce excellent silk. 

 He endeavoured to naturalize them in this country, 

 but could only succeed to a limited degree, being 



