IRubber as a TCaw /iDatertal, 381 



Experiments are at present being made in manufacturing rubber 

 cloth to take the place of water-proof articles which, until now, were 

 composed of glazed linen with a layer of rubber. 



III. 



IMPORTANCE OF RUBBER AS A RAW MATERIAL. 



It is well known that rubber is used as a raw material, in the manu- 

 facture not only of water-proof goods, but also of many others which 

 could not be produced as advantageously with any other substance. 



Every year it is employed in the manufacture of a great many 

 articles that were not made of that material the year before. It may, 

 perhaps, not be an exaggeration to say, that in course of time it will 

 partially supersede iron. These considerations are sufficient to estab- 

 lish the fact that the demand for rubber, in the markets of the world, 

 far from diminishing, will, in the future, increase considerably. 



Thus far, rubber is not the product of a cultivated tree. In every 

 part of the American continent from which it has thus far come, it has 

 been extracted from trees growing wild, and that had not been origi- 

 nally planted by the hand of man. In every locality, also, it is ex- 

 tracted at the cost of the tree itself; either because this is cut down, 

 owing to the belief that the sap is thus more abundant, or because of 

 the frequency with which extractions are made, or of the bad system 

 in use of making them, which injures the trunk and thus kills the tree. 

 Notwithstanding that certain measures to protect it have been adopted 

 in different countries, such as Honduras where a fine of fifty dollars 

 is imposed for every rubber-tree destroyed on government lands, they 

 have proved ineffectual. 



The inevitable consequence of this must be that the production will 

 diminish, unless a large number of plantations are soon established, and 

 perhaps even in that case; and as it is not probable that extensive 

 plantations will be made, if only because it would be a new enterprise 

 and for that reason a somewhat risky one, the certain result will be, 

 that the supply in the present rubber districts will decline in proportion 

 as the demand increases. 



Now then, it is an incontrovertible principle that the value of an 

 article depends upon the demand which there is for it, on the one 

 hand, and its production, on the other. When the former increases, 

 and the latter diminishes, its value rises in proportion. To-day, the 

 average price of rubber is sixty cents a pound. It is almost certain 

 that within five years it will reach seventy-five cents, and, perhaps, as 

 much as one dollar a pound, owing to the facts above mentioned. 

 The value of rubber has been quadrupled in Soconusco in less than 



