October, 1910,1 



295 



Saps and Bwndatiom, 



& Co., Limited, in London ; Suarez & Co., 

 who have their own house in Europe ; 

 as do Alves Braga Rubber Estates and 

 Trading Co., and so on. 



Para has good cable communication 

 with Europe, but rather round about 

 ones with America. The city is connect- 

 ed with Manaos by a cable which is laid 

 in the bed of the Amazon and which 

 gives good service except for occasional 

 interruptions. If rubber is high, there 

 are some who claim that the cable is 

 purposely cut to keep the news from 

 reaching Manaos until certain trades 

 are effected. I only met one man who 

 would acknowledge that he had actu- 

 ally seen the cut ends, and he was not 

 an expert on cable matters and might 

 not have been able to tell a plain 

 fracture from axe work. My own idea 

 is that the river itself is perfectly com- 

 petent to supply enough interruptions 

 to suit anybody. Certain it is that one 

 steamer is kept busy nearly all of the 

 time attending to the thousand mile 

 strand that binds the two rubber cities 

 together. 



-There is also the wireless which proud- 

 ly lifts its head to heaven at Para and 

 Santarem. When the concession for its 

 installation was granted and the equip- 

 ment began to arrive, what profound 

 thankfulness filled the hearts of the 

 many who were marooned in Manaos, 

 often for a week at a time, hungering 

 and thirstiug for news of the outside 

 world. Their hope of freedom, how- 

 ever, from the vexatious tyranny of the 

 great river has so far borne no fruit. 

 Messages were dispatched from either 

 end, but failed to be received. The 

 official explanation, I believe, was that 

 the precipitation was so great as to 

 interrupt them, or was it that theie was 

 too much air in the atmosphere ? A 

 more probable reason is that the mes- 

 sages sent in the day time over the rubber 

 forests were gummed up by the flowing 

 latex and fell short of their destination. 

 Nor were night messages any more 

 successful. The big Brazilian fire-flies, 

 which are sporty things anyway, got in 

 the habit of racing with the electric 

 sparks and oftentimes beating them. It 

 will be evident to the most shallow 

 thinker that an operator standing on a 

 tower in mosquito ridden Santarem, 

 with a butterfly net in one hand and a 

 receiver in the other, sorting fire-flies 

 from flashes, would at times be slightly 

 inaccurate. And accuracy in matters 

 wireless is a prime necessity. 



So Manaos did not get in relief, and 

 the cable company have an extension of 

 their contract and are to lay a second 

 cable in the river bed. 



Dealing with Rubber from the 

 Forest, 



The beginning of rubber production is 

 really with the aviador who furnishes 

 the rubber producer, or seringueiro, 

 with all supplies and, in return, receives 

 and sells his rubber. The aviadores, and 

 there are hundreds of them, big and 

 little, have outfitting places not far 

 from the water front in Para and 

 Manaos. Some of them are not much 

 more than offices, others are great and 

 well-stocked stores. When an aviador 

 disc ivers what a seringueiro is going to 

 need for the coming season, he supplies 

 what he may have from his own stock, 

 which may be much or nothing. He 

 then divides the order into dry goods, 

 provisions, etc;., making up separate 

 orders for city merchants who handle 

 these goods. They fill the orders, 

 packed and delivered on the pier for 

 shipment. The aviadore then bills these 

 goods, accepting in payment therefor 

 notes that range from three to six 

 months. These notes are discounted by 

 the local bank and sometimes are ex- 

 tended for another six months, if times 

 are hard. The discount rates are from 

 10 to 24 per cent., according to the stand- 

 ing of the merchant. 



The aviador is over charged in his 

 purchases about 50 per cent, by the 

 general merchant. This is because of 

 the risk that the latter takes, as some 

 aviadores never pay at all, while others 

 may not be able to pay for one or two 

 years. 



When the aviador receives rubber he 

 sells for the seringueiro who is credited 

 with the amount received. In remitting 

 to the seringueiro, if money is sent the 

 commission is 20 per cent., if merchan- 

 dise, 10 per cent. 



In times past, according to the stories 

 of some rubber merchant it was au 

 exceedingly easy thing to become an 

 aviador. One asset was only necessary. 

 That was the friendship of a director of 

 a local bank. The man who planned to 

 become an aviador would register his 

 firm at the Junta Commercial with a 

 capital perhaps of 50 contos. Through 

 the director he would discount notes for 

 that amount. The money would be used 

 for buying shares in that bank, which 

 would be pledged in another bank for a 

 certain amount. This money he would 

 deposit in a third bank. By this means 

 the aviador was able to give two banks 

 as references. In one of them he was 

 a stockholder to the amount of about 

 45 contos, and in the other a depositor 

 of 40 contos. Without a cent of money 

 of his own, he would be rated as be ing 



