Oct, i, 1894.] 
THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. 
2ZX 
locality, quality, irrigation, and nature of growth on 
them. If the land at these prices are situated more 
than fif ieen miles from a town of 3,000 inhabitants, 
or from a rail road, these prices will be reduced one- 
half; if from thirty to sixty miles, they will be sold 
at one-fourth ; and if more than si>,ty miles, at one- 
eighth of the prices named. These lands may be 
paid for in cash, or in ten annual ins'alinencs at 6 
per cent interest. If at any time the purchaser shows 
that the improvements he has made are worth double 
the interest due, he is excused from payment of such 
interest ; ai d if the improvements be worth twice as 
much as the price to be paid by the terms of the 
sale, he is exempted from payment of all interest due. 
Journal of the Society of Arts. 
NO RESULTS FROM RUBBER CULTURE 
UP TO DATE. 
By Herman Reimebs.* 
In requesting my views in relation to the practi- 
cability of planting lndiarubber as a commercial 
undertaking, The lndiarubber World is a?king a 
question that is of great interest to me, and I want 
to take some pains to answer it. Suppose we ex- 
amine the record of rubber-planting as chronicled in 
The lndiarubber World, and let me see if I can 
recognize any of the owners' names given there as 
present shippers of rubber. For instance, you spoke 
first of the experiments at ti e Royal Bota: ical 
Gardens at Ceyiou, Singapore, and Trinidad; as far 
as I know they have resulted in demonstrating that 
the rubber-tree can be grown artificially under 
favourable conditions, but ihey have proved nothing 
of value commercially. Then there were the plants 
sent from the Kew Gardens in London to the Gambia 
Scttl ment, on the west coa-st of Africa. These 
produced thrifty trees and were the means of inducing 
some parties to invest a good deal of money in 
rubber-culture. We get rubber from that section but 
have not been able to find that any of it comes 
from plantations. We would trace it in tois way : 
a bale of rubber from a plantation would be prepared 
differently from that which comes from the virgin 
forest. Now we do not get any Assam rubber that 
is a bi'- different in quality from what we have had 
right along ; hence I believe that the plantations are 
not producing anything for us. 
Further o , it was mentioned that General Feron 
of Hondu as owned a plantation grown from cuttings 
brought from Br zil. It is time we heard from tnat 
plantation if there is anything in it. The American 
Exporting and Trading Co. undertook the organiza- 
tion of companies for cultivating coffee, sugar, and 
rubber in Mexico, but so far we have not heard a 
word from them. In 1890 rubber-plantations in 
Chiapas, Mexico, were mentioned with the report 
that fine results were being obtained. I certakly 
have not heard of any rubber from there. Indeed, 
a friend of mine who is a banker at Zacatecas, 
JUexico, wrote me that as far as he knew there was 
nothing i'j any of the rubber-planting schemes there. 
This answer would a'so cover the rep rt that a 
German syndicate had large lands in Guererro, Mex- 
ico. Then it was reported that somebody who had 
iovested $5,000 in a rubber-plantation near Cordova, 
Mexico, drew out of it $20,U00 in one year. I would 
like to ask wuo he is, where he sends his rubber, 
and how it is labelled. In 1891 it was claimed that 
1J tons of cultivated rubber, from trees planted 
in Java ten years before, had been sold in Holland. 
This began to look like progress. We certainly ought 
by this time to get more Java rubber, and we should 
like it. Many of the rubber-manufacturers have 
wished to use it and. from time to time, have called 
for it. There are two or three tons of it occasion- 
ally sold in London, but that is about all it amounts to. 
At one time it was chronicled that rubber-plants 
were sent from Para to Libreville, in French Gaboon. 
The first importation was 15,000 young plants, and 
* Momber of the firm of Keimers and Mycr, India- 
rubber importers, New York and Boston. 
the next year they planned to send 200,000. No fur- 
ther information has come from this region, nor are 
we looking for any rubber from that plantation. In 
1873 it was reported that a plantation for Assam 
rubber had been started by the British Government, 
and that in 1890 it covered 1,106 acres. It is now 
twenty years since that plantation was started, and 
it certainly is time for results. Where are they? 
Turning to the United States consular reports that 
were secured by your journal I have looked in vain 
for names that should give us some clue as to the 
possible shippers of cultivated rubber, and I find 
none. I have mentioned but a few of all thf> 
experiments that I have seen chronicled, and it is 
my belief that, look as carefully as you will, you 
will not be able to discover that any successful 
rubber-planting has been done. From time to time 
we get samples of cultivated rubber, and then we 
hear nothing more from the senders. In one case, 
recently, a smal lot of very fine rubber was sent 
from a plantation near Para. It was so good that 
we immediately cabled for 26,000 pounds of it, but 
that is the last we have ever heard of it. I have 
never personally known of a shipment of 1000 pounds 
from any plantation, and if that amount had been 
shipped from .any of them I believe that I should 
have known of it. Two years ago, in Europe, I 
met a German who had a place in Cordova, who 
told me he had 20,000 rubber trees growing, and that 
I should have samp'es of rubber the next year. 
Hearing nothing from him, I looked up his New York 
connections. They smiled when 1 asked about the 
plantation, and intimated that it was sort of a fad 
of their cliem, and that they did not believe it to 
be a commercial success. I knew a case very similar 
to this in Peru. A gentleman had planted the trees 
and woii'd soon be ready to send samples, but they 
have never arrived. 
I honestly cannot see any real sign of progress in 
rubber cultivation. I do not tay this to discourage 
those who are putting time and money into the 
schemes, but am looking at it simply from the 
standpoint of a possible investor. I think that it 
would be a more practical thing to so cultivate the 
natives thut they will not destroy the trees ; indeed, 
much progress has already been made in this line. 
But, as a matter of fact, let th ■ natives work as hard 
as they will in South America, I do not believe that 
they can t xhaust the rubber, even by cutting down 
the trees. In the abused districts the trees start up 
again and grow very rapidly, and there will be a 
new forest in a very few years without any care or 
cultivation. There is another point about this culti- 
vation business that should be considered. Rubber- 
trees grow in swampy and malarial districts, 
where none but the native Indians live. Some years 
ago a wealthy rubber-manufacturer sent a hundred 
men to gather rubber for him, but not one cime 
back, — a!l perished miserably in the swamps. This 
is the case no matter what class of men are sent; 
Poles, Norwegians, and Chinese all suc /umb to the 
terrible exposure that they are forced to undergo. 
This matter of rubber-cultivation, if practical, would 
be of the greatest interest to us, but I repeat that 
I do not believe that it is practical, or that the 
results will ever justify the outlay of lime and money 
that .is necessary to even make a beginning. — 
lndiarubber World. 
AN EXPERIMENT WITH CACAO SEEDS. 
It was mentioned in my Bulletin No. 19, page 2, 
that in Nicaragua the practice existed of removing 
the outer skin or testa before sowing Cacao or 
Mango seeds. The practice of softening by irumer- 
t-ion in water the testa of seeds, or cutting or filling 
it until a sufficient opening has been made for 
moiiture to enter, has long being practised by Horti- 
culturist. Seeds of Guilatidiua or " Nicker," so cut, 
will germinate in a few days, while uncut, they will 
remain for twelve months without germinating. 
Again, iu the case of Ceara Knbber — Sfamhot glaaovti 
— the Brazil nut — Berthollctia excetia — the Queensland 
