and Magazine of the Ceylon Agricultural Society. 



551 



from the district of M' Bongo, Serra Andrade 

 Corvo, South Angola between 12° 50' and 14° S. 

 lat. and 14° 40' and 15° 20' E. long. ; altitude 

 given as between 1,200 and 1,500 ra." Some of 

 these seeds were distributed to various suitable 

 Botanic Gardens aDd some were sown at Kew, 

 on the 2nd January of this year. The seeds 

 germinated quickly and developed two cotyle 

 dons with petioles nearly 1 cm. in length ; the 

 laminae are oblong-obovate obtuse, glabrous and 

 slightly fleshy. 



The plumule usually develops with an elon- 

 gated first internode, about 1 cm. in length, the 

 subsequent internodes being short. The inter- 

 nodes are delicately hairy with short glandular 

 hairs. The plumular ltaves, which show a de- 

 cussate arrangement, are more or less ovate, 

 glandular, and have a well-marked mid rib. In 

 the course of two months the young shoot has 

 reached the stage shewn in Fig. 1, and at the 

 end of seven months the seedlings have grown 

 to the size shewn in Figs. 2 and 3. 



At the end of two months the tap root had 

 swollen to form an elongated fusiform tuber 

 1 cm. long by about 2 mm. in diameter, and 

 during this time it is pulled deeper into the soil 

 by the action of root shortening. The tuberous 

 root its the largest example, Fig. 3, is some 4-5 

 cm. in length and 9 mm. in diameter. 



Some seeds were also received at Kew from 

 the Botanic Gardens, Dahlem, Berlin, under the 

 name of Nitinga rosea in August, 1908, which 

 germinated, and it is now possible to recognize 

 that the young plants are probably seedlings of 

 Rap/iionacme utilis, the came Nitinga beiug 

 apparently a corruption of the native name 

 B'tinga or Vitinga. 



These latter plants, now a year old, have a 

 single shoot which has grown continuously and 

 is about 3 cm. long with five pairs of leaves 

 crowded towards the shoot apex. The tuber 

 which is becoming more globular measures l'o 

 cm. in diameter. Although Mr. May is of the 

 opinion that the Ecanda plants grow more 

 quickly in Angola than they do at Kew it 

 appears clear that the Raphionacme is not a 

 biennial plant as was at first suggested. 



In the Bulletin of the Imperial Institute, vol, 

 vi., 1908, pp. 390-393, a short account of the 

 analysis of the tubers of the Biiinga rubber 

 plant is given, derived from specimens received 

 from the Mozambique Company. — Kew Bulletin, 

 Nov 8, 1908. 



RUBBER IN SOUTH GOORG. 



Pollibetta, Oct. 16.— Mr. Alexander, who for 

 many years was a planter in this District, but 

 who has lately been in England, has come out 

 to open up land and plant Para rubber below 

 the Sampagi Ghaut, on the way to Mangalore, 

 at an elevation of 800 ft. above sea-level, for 

 Messrs. Chisholm and Morris, the former of 

 South Coorg and the latter of Chamrajnagar, 

 Mysore. It has been arranged to plant up 250 

 acres next season. At this low elevation, with 

 an assured heavy rainfall, it is probable that 

 Para will prove a success. The land to be opened 

 lies inuide the Coorg border. — M. Mail, 



RUBBER IN BRAZIL. 



Mr. Cheetham (Secretary to the British Lega- 

 tion at Rio de Janeiro), in his report on the 

 trade of Brazil for the year 1908, contributes 

 a valuable and interesting statement on the 

 rubber industry in that country. He says the 

 rubber trade of the Amazon Valley is in many 

 respects one of the most remarkable commercial 

 movements in existence. If the value of the 

 product put on the world's markets be com- 

 pared with the trifling expenditure of human 

 energy involved in its collection the contrast 

 is an extraordinary one. The whole of this 

 valuable trade, in the first place, is 



GATHERED BY A HANDFUL OF ILLITERATE, 

 UNTRAINED MEN, 



who taking their lives in their hands, enter the 

 vastuncultiyated wilderness of theUpper Amazon 

 forests and, on behalf of distant aviadores and 

 nominal forest owners, tap the trees and smoke 

 the rubber that later on figures as the second 

 asset in Brazilian commercial and financial 

 prosperity. Deprived of her rubber output 

 Brazil would lose one-third of her purchasing 

 capacity. Yet, Mr. Cheetham states, although 

 the source of so large a part of her national 

 income, Brazil as a whole does nothing for her 

 rubber producers, and these, in equal disregard 

 of great responsibilities, do little or nothing 

 for their rubber trees. The whole rf the vast 

 wealth of the Amazon rubber output is drawn 

 from the virgin wealth of uncultivated forest 

 products, the product being obtained by the 

 crudest methods from the natural wilderness of 

 rubber-giving trees. 



Were the rubber industry of the Amazon 

 Valley, Mr Cheetham adds, established on orga- 

 nised lines of cultivation and scientific develop- 

 ment, the number of persons actively employed 

 in rubber production (now officially and inaccu- 

 rately given as 5,337) would be one of many 

 hundreds of thousands. But 



THE METHODS OF PRODUCTION 



have shown no advance during a period 

 of 12 years, while the cost of production must 

 have greatly increased. That Para rubber, he 

 continues, as it is today exploited can continue 

 successfully to compete when once the East 

 India plantations have attained a large area of 

 development seems highly improbable, The 

 cost of the bare necessities of life, to say 

 nothing of the comforts of existence, has greatly 

 increased, and the absence of these things 

 renders the weary lot of the Amazon rubber ex- 

 tractor one of the most depressing in existence, 

 Half submerged in a swampy forest, he has few 

 or no companions and no social life at all. 

 A stranger from far away, he makes no home, 

 but squats where he can best tap the surroun- 

 ding trees. The owner of the estate neither 

 resides on it nor pays an absentee tax. His 

 ownership restricts itself to taking out papers 

 of registration before someone else has obtained 

 them, and then leasing the right to find and 

 tap what rubber trees the undefined vagueness 

 of this " estate " may afford the hardy Ceara 

 or Maratihao explorer who acts a3 his tenant. 

 There is little likelihood of Amazon rubber 



