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IV.—FIJI INDIA-RUBBER. 
[K.B., 1898, pp. 164-166.] 
the Kew Report for 1877, p. 31, it is stated that a specimen 
of native caoutchouc had oe received from Sir Arthur Gordon 
(now Lord Stanmore), Governor of Fiji. This is still in the 
w Museum. It was favourably reported upon at the time 
This was twenty-one years ago. t the present time 
the price would a tind be 2s. or 2s. 6d. per pound. After so 
promising a beginning it was boped that a successful rubber 
industry w ould » established in the Fiji Archipelago. So far, 
however, this expectation has not been realized. 
It was stated oa the tree from which the rubber was obtained 
“was very com in the islands." In 187 r. John Horne, 
F.L.S., then Director of the Boise Gardens at Mauritius, visited 
Fiji and paid particular attention to their economic resources. 
A report on the Caoutchouc or India rubber plants is published 
as an Appendix to his * Year in Fiji” (London, Stanford, 1881), 
pp. 195-202. 
The Fijia an name for caoutchouc is *drega," and the 
^ drega kau ” is generally applied to all trees that have a milly 
juice. 
Mr. Horne found a species of Tabernaemontana (since named 
T. Thurstoni, Baker, Journ. Linn. Soc. XX., 368), with white 
flower and a reddish-yellow berry about 4 inch diameter. “When 
wounded a thin milk-white juice exudes which yields a ee 
quantity of caoutchouc." Locally ME is known as * Kau Drega," 
or “ Talotalo." Mr. olmes (in the or to the 
Governor’s despatch of the 15th “April, 1898) speaks of it as 
- Pas edly our best rubber-yielding tree.” He A ug : z It grows 
a large size. Those that I saw were up to 18 inches or 2 feet 
rider at the base. It is found scattered in the forest on the 
hills and valleys, but is not gregarious.” The specimen of rubber 
from this tree recently received from Fiji was hard and gutta-like 
and without elasticity. In the condition in which it reached this 
country it was of little or no commercial valu 
The most promising india rubber plant met with by Mr. Horne 
was Alstonia plumosa, Labill.; of this possibly, A. villosa, 
enn is k Meier form. The account given of this tree is as 
prieta 
“The ' Fijian n name,” s Mr. Horne, “is * Drega quruquru. 
They collect the jujse ^ 4 their mouths, which makes the 
caoutchouc as adhesive as glue, and of about the consistency and 
colour of putty. To get the juice, the Fijians break off the leaves 
m the branches, and collect it as it flows from the petioles and 
the à wounds on the branches caused by 
leaves. The branches are next broken off the trees, and each 
branch is broken up into sd ne 6 inches to a foot long. 
"As fast as the pieces are n, first one end of them is 
placed in the mouth, then de iut till the mouth is full of 
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