Gums, Resins, 



486 



[June, 1910. 



NOTES ON THE PREPARATION OF 



RUBBER PROM FUNTUMIA 

 ELASTIC A ON THE IVORY COAST. 



(By A. Chevalier, in Bull, Jard. 

 Col, 1910. Abstracted by J. C. Willis.) 



All over this district the natives bleed 

 the trees by herring-bone incision?, the 

 ribs of which often meet round the tree. 

 The same trees are bled at intervals 

 often of less than six months. The 

 herring bone is taken right up the trunk 

 and often out upon the branches, but 

 the higher cuts do not heal with the 

 rapidity of the lower. Many trees have 

 been destroyed by the tapping that has 

 gone on, for Funtumia is not a good 

 resistant tree. He recommends that it 

 be not bled before the eighth year. 



REMARKS ON THE SELECTION AND 

 THE BLEEDING OP MAN1HOT 

 GLAZIOVII. 



(By O. Labroy, Journ. d'Agr. trop., 

 31st March, 1910. Abstracted by 

 J. C. Willis.) 



He refers to a preceding article by 

 M. Cardozo, according to whom the good 

 trees in a Ceara plantation do not ex- 

 ceed 20 %, and goes on to state that one 

 cannot tell the good trees by external 

 examination of the leaves, &c, though it 

 is supposed that the trees of poor yield- 

 ing capacity have a thick much fissured 

 bark. He then goes on to consider the 

 various methods proposed for improving 

 the breed. It may be noted that careful 

 selection of Ceara Rubber is already 

 well under way at Peradeniya. 



SOME REMARKS ON RUBBER 

 GATHERING IN EASTERN PERU. 



By W. T. Burres. 



(Prom the American Review, Vol. I., 

 No. 2, February, 1910.) 



Having been asked to tell you some- 

 thing about rubber in Peru, — I refer 

 to wild, not cultivated rubber — so far 

 as it came under my observation during 

 the time I spent in that country, I 

 will endeavour to recount to you, as 

 briefly as I can, some of my personal 

 experiences while acting as surgeon of 

 an American mining company in Peru. 



I must begin by saying that what 

 I know about rubber per se is a minus 

 quantity, but, happening to|be connected 



with a company that, among other 

 interests, took up that of rubber, I did 

 see something of its field of operations 

 and certainly learned to appreciate the 

 enormous difficulties and constant dan- 

 gers attending an enterprise having for 

 its object the collection of this valu- 

 able product, the uses for which seem 

 to be daily increasing in the manu- 

 facture of articles of all sorts from 

 automobile tires to hygienic tooth 

 brushes. 



You, gentlemen, are, of course, pri- 

 marily interested in cultivated rubber, 

 but, inasmuch as the wild product 

 constitutes at present by far the greater 

 proportion of the world's total supply, 

 I assume that, along with your efforts 

 to replace, by scientific cultivation of 

 the various species of rubber-producing 

 trees, the drain upon the natural sources, 

 which, immense as they are, are yet 

 not inexhaustible, you pay some atten- 

 tion to what is being done in the opening 

 up of new fields of supply. 



The area of eastern Peru is very great, 

 — very much greater, indeed, than is 

 usually supposed. When one speaks of 

 South America one does not at once 

 conceive of it as composed of a number 

 of very large countries, but perhaps 

 rather the contrary; one seldom realises 

 that Brazil for instance, is almost as big 

 as the United States, excludiug Alaska. 

 But, reverting to Peru, I may remark that 

 the frontier between this couutry and 

 Brazil has a length of between 1.600 and 

 1,800 miles. As much as from three to six 

 months are frequently occupied by 

 native rubber producers in the making 

 of a round trip from one district to 

 another, travelling as they do by canoe 

 along the various waterways and occa- 

 sionally making rather difficult portages. 

 When, therefore, we here in Mexico 

 have to get to points involving per- 

 haps a horseback or muleback ride of 

 four or five days, and think we are 

 pretty remote from civilisation, such 

 ventures sink into insignificance in com- 

 parison with the month-long journeyings 

 which the pioneer in South America 

 has to undertake in puisuit of his 

 business. 



Upon the first trip that I made into 

 the interior of Peru after reaching the 

 Pacific coast of South America, where 

 I had often been before, we started 

 from Molleudo, — which serves as the 

 chief port for Southern Peru and Bolivia 

 (the latter country having now no 

 seaboard at all of its own), —proceeding, 

 by rail, via Arequipa, having an ele- 

 vation of 7,500 ft. above sea level, up 

 into the plateau of the Andes, occupy- 



