266 Timehri. 
industry will lift its giant head and proceed on the paths of peace and ~ 
increasing profit. The industrial expansion that has marched with the 
activities of the balata and timber industries during the past quinquen- 
nium seems to be reflected in the increased importations of certain articles 
of dietary used by the labourers. I do not go back to a deeade ago, for 
it is within, say, the last four years that balata has loomed so largely, and 
within the last year that so much attention and energy have been 
concentrated on the possibilities of the Guiana forests as a provider of 
furniture woods. In respect to the last-named proposition, there is 
the big agreeable fact that the S. W. Bonsall Timber Properties, 
Ltd., of New York, have introduced capital here and are directing 
their efforts towards increasing the utility of certain timber-producing 
lands in the three counties. The company’s energies promise to 
play a most significant part in the colony’s economic development. 
It has afforded employment to a goodly number of hewers and con- 
verted into economic units those who otherwise would have made but 
poor contribution to the indirect taxation revenue. Withal, it has 
awakened a consciousness of the colony’s possibilities in a direction which 
its own people have all along sadly neglected. We find that in spite of 
enhanced values, the importations of beef and pork went up during the 
quinquennium from 17,655 barrels to 19,391 barrels. While 389,025 Ibs. 
of tinned fish sufficed for requirements in the first year of the period, 
indents were filled last year for as many as 506,629 lbs. Of dried fish 
there was need for more also, the respective importations being 40,399 
ewts. and 41,528 ewts. The demand for canned meats also grew greater, 
the annual consumption advancing from 348,665 Ibs. to 426,779 lbs. In 
flour, however, there was a falling-off from 195,444 packages to 176,319 
packages, a phenomenon not to be wondered at in view of the high prices 
in the supplying markets and the competition set up by creole rice which 
in some measure is a substitute for flour. Nor should it be forgotten 
that during the past two years the import duty has been raised to the 
extent of five per cent. on the tax—$1 per barrel. The female relations 
and connections of the sturdy axemen and bleeders shared also in the 
increased income of comfort. We find an appreciable augmentation of 
the indents for haberdashery and millinery and linen, cotton, and woollen 
goods—from $250,402 to $293,176 worth in respect of the former and 
from $826,110 to $921,849 worth in respect of the latter. Thereto the 
local lumber (particularly crabwood) industry has also contributed. A 
gauge of its improvement may be gathered from the fact that whereas 
ten years ago our importations of lumber, dressed and undressed, amounted 
to 5,981,497 feet, only 2,647,332 feet came to hand last year. Another 
indication of progress is afforded by the sensible increase of trade licences. 
The number of shop and store licences has gone up from 2,175 to 3,144, 
an improvement of more than 44 percent. If we were able exactly 
to evaluate the proportional contribution to the commercial economy of 
the several industries, there is no doubt that it would be found that that 
of the hinterland enterprises was second to none. _ It is notorious that the 
majority of labourers on the sugar estates suffer from the disease known 
