88 
- A concise summary, published by Dr. —— in the Appendix 
to the Report of the New Products Commiss meo cpm Papers, 
Peri. 1881, No. 13, p. 9), is reproduced be low 
“T am desirous of taking this opportuni y ét putting upon 
record something of the history of the Produced » the valuable 
Para rubber into the East, which has been effected at a large cos 
and with much Sap ees. Mas n the Government of India had 
determined upon the erprise, a commission was 
Mr. Wiekham, then ver * Santarem, to collect seed at the rate 
fou r n ny a few 
height of 18 inches.’ (Kew Report, 1876.) At Sir Joseph Hooker’s 
suggestion, it had been previously arranged between the India 
and Colonial Offices that owing to the want of any accessible and 
roperly constituted Botanical Garden in any part of India 
suitable for the growth of this completely tropical species, the 
seedlings should be sent to Ceylon to be cultivated and propagated 
for subsequent distributions to Burma, and other hot and moist 
districts of the Indian Empire. Owing to the plants’ rapid 
jan — € pecial ad to be made 
gro 
their tra ransmission, and, on August 12th, thirty-eight of these, 
poe 1 UY p na Aas despatched from Kew in charge of a 
gardener (W. Chapm n due course they were received at 
Poldostys i in very ila r 
Mr. Cross's share in the introduction of Para rubber was a 
very small one. He, also, had been sent by the Indian Govern- 
ment to South America to bring home live plants in case the 
kip miese of living seed should prove impossible, and he arrived 
at Kew n 2lst t November, 1876. He brought with him about 
; ith 
ie 
scarcely three per cent. could be saved. About 100 plants 
propagated at Kew from these were subsequently sent to Ceylon. 
- *'The cost of ait] the seeds of Para rubber, freight and 
other expenses, appears to have been no less than £1, 505 4s. 2d. 
the Wardian cases alone deris £120, and the gardener and his 
sage £163. kd whole of this large expenditure was Pini by 
the ye Government. An undertaking involving s an 
outlay as this, it is s obviously beyond the power of the Bxactive 
of this Colony carry 0 ee but in this case, it is Ceylon which 
(from elimatie causes chi efly) appears likely t o benefit most 
largely from the successful action of the Goretbment of India." 
EXPERIMENTAL PLANTING IN CEYLON. 
As Ceylon was adopted as the central point in the East Indies 
for the cultivation and distribution of the rubber plants intro- 
duced by the Government of India from tropical America, this 
island He aed took an active part in starting experimental 
plantation 
