Dec 1900.] 



155 



Saps and Exudations. 



At the time a great many planters were of opinion that what they wanted to make 

 for was chemical parity. It was possible— and he thought, indeed, probable — that 

 they ran that hare rather too fast. He sent sixteen samples submitted to Prof. 

 Dunstan and Mr. Gray, who was a partner in Silvertown Rubber Works, and who 

 had a good knowledge of the chemistry of rubber. The samples were in varied 

 forms— many in crepe form, some sheet and some biscuits. The advocates of crepe at 

 that time claimed that by the continuous passing of the rubber through the 

 rollers they got a greater chemical purity than was to be found in sheet or biscuits, 

 and they hoped that their rubber could get the prize, and so crepe would be 

 acknowledged the best. However, when the samples came back, it was found that 

 in regard to chemical purity crepe came sixth, so that passing through the rollers 

 did not give rubber chemical purity. But what was chiefly interesting about the 

 matter was that these samples were also submitted to Mr. Gray for his opinion as 

 to their value for the market, and those which were most chemically pure would 

 not, in his opinion, fetch the highest price in the market ; so that it was more than 

 possible that as Dr. Christy and other speakers had said, they were taking 

 something out which it would be of advantage to leave in. However, if that con- 

 ference began to make men think of a method whereby simply by using creosote, 

 which was the simplest way of imitating the smoking of Brazil, they could cure in 

 such a way as to make fibre or nerve or whatever they might call it, so that they 

 might get the highest price for their rubber, it was a step in the right direction- In 

 regard to the figures Mr. Wright and Mr. Ryan gave, the word "alienated" was 

 used for land planted. As far as the P. M.S. were concerned, if they had taken 

 the figures of alienated land, that meant 20,000, 30,000 or 40,000 which was merely 

 taken up, and w T hich it would be impossible to plant for many years. If they had 

 10,000 acres, it would be absolutely impossible to plant it all within ten years, so that 

 if the figures referred to alienation they must be discounted very largely if they 

 wanted to use them for the purpose of considering the amount of rubber produced. 



Mr. Wright :— In calculating the figures representing the districts to which 

 Mr. Carruthers referred, I may say that in working out these figures, we accepted 

 those Mr. Carruthers gave in his last annual report (laughter) which is 30,000 

 merely — which is very little for your place, and may be exceeded before the end 

 of 1906. 



Mr. Carruthers :— Oh ! (laughter) I stand corrected. I may say I did not 

 follow them very carefully, but I must say a quarter-of-a-million acres rather 

 staggered me. I did not think my figures assumed such large numbers as that. 



Mr. Wright :— The 250,000 acres cover the whole Indo-Malayan region. As a 

 matter of fact the figures gave us nearly half-a-million alienated, but we only want 

 to take into consideration the minimum, 250,000, planted in 1906, to come into 

 bearing in 1913. It is the minimum you can possibly allow for. 



Mr. Carruthers : — The question is whether these figures are correct. 



THE SALE OP UNSUITABLE LAND BY GOVERNMENT. 



Col. Byrde said he had been asked to read a paper by Mr. F. C. Roles who 

 had seen a copy of Mr. Wright's lecture, and based his remarks on them. 



Mr. Roles wrote:— While realising that it is easy to prove anything by 

 suppositional figures, I agree with the lecturer that it is Avise not to anticipate a 

 reduction in the world's output of wild rubber. Threatened industries die hard ; 

 and the output of plantations cut out of rubber forests and worked under European 

 supervision (as for example Dr. Cuthbert Christy's Uganda Concession) has to be 

 reckoned with, though it will presumably be classed by the trade as plantation and 

 not as wild rubber. It will be free from impurities, and will help the Congo stuff 

 with pei'centages of impurities very much higher than the Brazilian standard 



