57« 



nursery a five-year-old Arabian coffee tree which enjoys complete 

 shade, and which is at this moment loaded with berries." 



Tea. — In spite of various diseases which have attacked the leaves 

 of the tea plant the Agricultural Department is able to report fair 

 progress with this product. The condition of a large proportion 

 of the trees leaves no doubt that under favourable conditions of 

 soil the plants will thrive during showery weather. It is note- 

 worthy that Arabs and natives take more interest in tea than in 

 any other new product at Dunga. When the leisure loving and 

 improvident character of the Swahili is taken into consideration, 

 as also that of the Arab, and these qualities apply largely to both, 

 it appears to the writer to be half the battle that they should be 

 awake to the advantages to be obtained from the cultivation of this 

 article of trade. 



Vanilla. — 'It would appear from a comparison of the samples of 

 vanilla with those of other countries, which have been sent to the 

 United Kingdom, that Zanzibar can compete with other vanilla- 

 producing countries such as Seychelles. 



VIEWS OP A MANAOS RUBBER MERCHANT. 



During a recent visit to New York of Mr. N, H. Witt, a lead- 

 ing rubber merchant of Manaos, the rubber centre of the upper 

 Amazon, he was asked by The India Rubber World for his views 

 on the practicability cf companies being organised to work on a 

 large scale in the movement of rubber direct from the producing 

 districts to the consuming markets. 



" I do not believe that such a thing can be done as yet," said he. 

 u Not that I profess to know more about the subject than any one 

 can know who has spent several years in the rubber trade on the 

 Amazon, and who has felt an interest in everything that has gone 

 on around him pertaining to rubber. My own business is that of 

 buying and selling rubber along the lines of established custom. 

 But I have seen nothing that would lead me to" take an interest 

 personally in such an undertaking as vou suggest. And 1 have 

 seen not a few failures. 



" There was, for instance, the Comptoir Colonial Francais, which 

 lately went into bankruptcy in Paris, after losing about $2,000,000 

 in a little more than a year's trading in rubber on the Amazon. 

 These companies, starting without any knowledge of conditions 

 in the rubber countries, send out managers who feel self confident 

 and who are not disposed to learn anything from persons who have 

 been longer on the ground and have gained, perhaps by painful 

 and costly experience, some knowledge of the facts which have to 

 be dealt with. 



" The difficulty of the labor problem is an old story which con- 

 tinues to be repeated. In the Amazon valley all the labor must be 

 imported, together with provisions. Whether the trouble is less 

 in this regard in Bolivia, where there are Indians in the rubber 

 forests who can be induced to work, 1 do not know. But even there, 



