43 



tender my thanks. To those I promised to visit but never 

 saw, my humble apologies are now offered. 



Bound for Penang. 



I left Colombo on , Easter Saturday, i8th April, at 

 8 p.m., by the P. and O. " Delta," bound for Penang. 

 There were very few passengers, and I had a good rest. 

 Rubber tiling could nowhere be found on the " Delta " 

 as on the " Prinz Eitel Friedrich," though the floors of 

 the smoking saloons on both decks were provided with red 

 rubber mats about half an inch or more in thickness. 

 Some of the staiir treads consisted of wood with strips of 

 rubber inlaid ; altogether a poor show of rubber on board. 

 That is why I had an easy time. We arrived at Penang 

 at daybreak, April 23rd. The journey was unnecessarily 

 prolonged. 



In the Straits Settlements. 



I had the pleasure immediately on arrival of meeting 

 Mr. S. H. Menzies, who is planting rubber in Ipoh, 

 Perak, the Hon. Mr. John Turner, of Caledonia Estate, 

 Wellesley Province, and Messrs. Anthony and Anderson, 

 the tea and rubber brokers ; I also went to see the repre- 

 sentatives of Messrs. Boustead and Co., Messrs. Hutten- 

 bach, Liebert and Co., and then made for the Botanic 

 Gardens in charge of Mr. 'W'alter Fox, the Suiperintendent 

 of Forests and Gardens, Penang. Mr. Fox made the 

 afternoon pleasant and instructive in the beautifully 

 situated Botanic Garden on Penang Hill. The Garden is 

 more or less horse-shoe shaped, is situated in a gently un- 

 dulating valley, and surrounded by well-wooded hills ; 

 there are only some 60 acres altogether, but many plants 

 are growing there which are of interest to the rubber 

 ■world. 



Rubber Plants in Penang. 



There are no European plantations to speak of in 

 Penang. At the time rubber cultivation was booming in 

 the Malay States, the native agriculturists of Penang 

 — mainly Chinese — had their lands occupied with coco- 

 nuts, nutmegs, cloves, etc.; at the present time not more 

 than about 2,000 Para trees are, according to Mr. Fox, 

 flourishing in the island. In the early days, owing to the 



