161 
prevent the growth of weeds, as well as to serve as manure. In 
planting the rubber tree the ground should be perfectly cleaned 
for a circle at least a yard in diameter and the tree placed in the 
1 
centre 
incomparably better results will be Kis pie than by planting by 
seed. The nursery is formed in damp ground, shaded and well 
worked, and the seed (which is apicem imi in "March and April) 
planted. at intervals of about a foot. The seed is planted just as 
gathered, with gum and all ; washing rami injure the later growth 
and may even ni sprouting. After a year in the nursery the 
ei are taken out with great care (it is best if the earih adheres 
to the roots) and transplanted. 
“The least distance at =e rubber trees should be set out is 
st 8 
th 
covering the ground as has previously been explained. In the 
third and fourth years, two to three cleanings per year should be 
made; and from the fifth year, one cleaning annually will suffice 
em the Sec of the tree impedes the further development of 
weeds ore beginning to exploit, he: trunk of the tree should 
intone T least 12 inches in diameter, and from 12 to 15 yards in 
height, for which from nine to ten years is necessary. 
“The milk may be extracted from the trees twice each year, 
during pom rainy season ; about two months after its commence- 
ment and towards the termination, > most propitious time being 
when the tree has dropped its lea 
* A tree planted and cultivated dide good conditions will give 
an annual product, after nine or ten years, of 1 pound of rubber, 
or, say 24 to 3 pounds o of milk. With proper study of the nature 
of the rubber tree, the progress of its sap, and the fertilizers that 
might be best for it, it is very probable that this yield would be 
greatly increased, 
* EXTRACTION OF RUBBER. 
* Until now, the machete has been used in Guatemala to make 
the incisions in the u incisions in the form of small canals 
about three-fourths of an inch wide, which receive the milk. I 
other countries (as in the ‘East Indies) there is employed a kind 
of knife, which allows the making of an incision which is cleaner 
and better directed. 
“To extract a good quantity of milk it is not sufficient to make 
only one incision at the foot of the tree. Care should be taken 
that the bark of the tree remains intact in 02 continuous 
strip the entire height of one side of the tree; if the entire 
eircumference of the trunk were cut (even by ineisions situated 
at en en = tree would die within a few days, 
To avoid this we have seen the foto wike modes 
em e ed :— 
"1. 5 From a certain height above the roots, incisions are mad 
in the trunk every metre or metre and a quarter approxi mately, 
until within two metres of the first branches, Each incision 
