82 Timehri. 
both in Europe and in America, and for which those countries are alway so 
willing to pay the very highest market rate. 
The Balata Industry, in addition to suffermg from an influx of newcomers 
and an epidemic of mismanagement, has lately suffered from both indifferent 
and unreliable labour, and itis very likely to continue to suffer until forcible 
steps are taken to weed out the offenders. No doubt the Balata Committee may 
help to find a solution. Apart from that the only way to obtain something akin 
to reliable labour is by a strong combination amongst the different Balata 
Companies themselves—all working im a business-like way, and all agreeing 
on a business-like procedure. 
The labourers here can, as a very general rule, by the adoption of any regular 
system of discipline be made to conform to a befitting conduct. They are, on the 
whole, inthe absence of special temptations, a well-behaved body of men. 
When once they recognise that by violating the law, or by serious default 
towards any one of the Balata companies, they are liable to be discarded by 
al! the others, they will think twice before they play the double part which 
sv many have played in the past and which we regret to say, so many of them 
are still playing. It was principally on this account that the Balata Association 
was formed and the first promoters of this association deserve the greatest credit 
for endeavouring to put the Balata Industry on a sounder footing. Persist- 
ing in spite of discouragement and criticisms, Mr. Joseph A. King saw it 
eventually comprise the entire body of employers before he laid down his office. 
There is something to be said for the labourers, for all the blame for recent 
troubles must not be ascribed to him. Except the native Indian, the creole 
black man or the acclimatised black man, is the only worker that can successfully 
withstand the many hardships consequent on tropical forest life. Experience 
has too often and tow fully demonstrated this. The black man’s vitality, his 
power to bear hunger and fatigue are blessings which he does not appear to sufli- 
ciently recognise ; and which his employer insufficiently appreciates. They are 
valuable qualities for wealth-production in the colony which are not to be 
lightly overlooked. 
The foreman should preferably be a black man of long forest experience. He 
should thoroughly know his men and how to control them ; because to a very 
great extent on him rests the curtailment of unnecessary expenditure, together 
with the expedition’s successful issue. Ignorance or want of tact or absence 
of control in such @ man is ruinous. 
An attempt was lately made to produce elastic balata, and to a slight extent 
it succeeded. Although the balata eum is so rigid and so tenacious, yet as it 
admixes so readily with other of our forest gums there is good reason to hope 
that an article of great commercial value will not be long in forthcoming. 
In this brief outline of the Balata Industry only facts have been enunciated—- 
such as experience has led us to believe are indisputable. J believe the industry 
is still in its infancy and that instead of declining in consequence of recent 
troubles ana their disastrous financial results 1t will rapidly increase as a source 
of wealth to the operating capitalists and to the colony as a whole, 
