2 73 



product has periods ot fluctuation, and there is a larger demand tor 

 cheap products of this class than for dear ones. The future history 

 of prices has been compared with the past history of cinchona 

 and other products, which produces more misconception than any- 

 thing else. Cinchona, for instance, is only used practically for one 

 purpose, /. 6'., one ailment, consequently its sale depends on that 

 ailment, and it can easily be overproduced. Perhaps it is correct 

 to say that rubber has more trade-uses than any other cultivated 

 plant. This alone puts it on a safer basis than almost any other 

 plant to the cultivator. 



But surely no one expects that in future all rubber we produce 

 in any quantity is going to keep up at $sj$d. per lb. The amount 

 that will we hope be shortly produced in the Peninsula alone will 

 be enormous and who is going to supply the cheap rubber? When 

 12 or 13 years ago I was urging the planting of Para rubber by 

 planters in the Peninsula, the returns of fully bearing trees were 

 estimated at 2 lbs. each per year, and the price of the product at 2s. 

 per lb. It was shown then that on this very low estimate, the cul- 

 tivation would pay well. Prices of labour and other things have 

 risen since then, but even allowing for all this there does not seem 

 to be any fear of a sufficiently bad permanent fall to make the 

 cultivation unprofitable. 



Mr. STEPHENS has shown (Bulletin No. 5, p. I 71) how very cheap- 

 ly and with what simple apparatus the product can be prepared, 

 and I have no doubt that when the price falls low we shall have 

 found out many ways of reducing the cost of production. 



A somewhat feeble criticism on Mr. Carey's account of Mr. 

 STEPHENS' estate appears in the Colombo Observer, May 27th. 

 It is not worth reprinting. The only noticeable points are that the 

 author thinks that the farrier's knife used to make the cuts must 

 endanger the tree. From work in the Botanic Gardens we have 

 found that as a matter of fact the knife (an ordinary pruning knife 

 is used, but I doubt not a farrier's knife would do as well) is the 

 most satisfactory instrument to use, and is in many ways superior 

 to at least some of the tapping tools invented. 



The author finishes up with suggesting that Mr. STEPHENS 

 would do better to take a lesson from certain Ceylon estates and 

 put up a properly equipped factory, etc., which is very amusing 

 and shows that he has missed the whole point of the article which 

 is to show how cheaply rubber of first class quality can be made 

 and also like most of the good people of Ceylon that he is utterly 

 ignorant of the progress which the planters here have made in the 

 cultivation and preparation of rubber or that they are at least as 

 well up to date as those of Ceylon. 



Acetic Acid in Rubber. — A note appeared in the Pharmaceutical 

 Journal some time ago, in which the author thereof speaking of 

 Ceylon rubber stated that that was superior as it was prepared 

 without the use of acetic acid, while that of the Straits was inferior 

 on that account. As this was reproduced in several Journals, it is 



