July 1, 1903.] 
THE TROPIOAL 
AaRIOtlLTURIST. 
4>1 
THE TRADE PROSPECTS iX AMERICA. 
May 6. — The April issue of the journal oftlie 
Aiuerieau Asiatic Society, in the hccuuiI uute in its 
Current Co??inicn^ deals with the organisation of 
the National Tea Association of the United States. 
The Editor says : — Apart altogether from its main 
object of the preservation of tea from adultera- 
tion and spurious imitations and tlie consequent 
defence of the Tea Inspection Law against 
attack, there is a very promising field for the 
educating influence which such an Association 
can exert among the people of the United States. 
There can hardiy be a question that by intelli- 
gent and well-directed elfort the consumption of 
tea in this country may be increased twice its 
present proportions. There is no subject in 
reg ird to which greater ignorance prevails among 
the American public than the judicious choice 
and proper preparation of tea, and there is no 
beverage whose more extensive consumption can be 
RO justly defended. Every traveller in the United 
Slates knows how next to impossible it is to obtain 
a properly prepared cup of tea in any railroad 
restaurant, and the methods of preparation adopted 
in the popular restaurants of the great cities of 
this country are about equally objectionable. 
Considering that tea is the one beverage of popular 
use whose purity is absolutely guaranteed by law, 
and that it is the most econmical beverage known 
to civilisation, it must be reckoned as singular 
th.at the American people consume only one pound 
per head per annum. — iV. C, Herald, May 7. 
RUBBER AND THE ACRE DISPUTE. 
WAR IN MINIATURE. 
(From a Brazilian correspondent.) 
The trouble in the Acre district— a district on 
the head waters of the Amazon, on the confines 
ot Brazil and Bolivia— is immediately due to the 
collection of taxes upon the export rubber trade, 
but traceable ultimately to the dilatory and inef- 
ficieut delimitation of the boundary between the 
two countries. Since the Acre has (within the 
last few years) been opened up, it has been found 
that it furnishes a large supply of the best rubber, 
the 
ANNUAL PRODUCTION" BEING WORTH NEARLY 
ONE MILLION POUNDS STERLING. 
Formerly the centre of the Soutii America 
rubber trade was Para, but of late years it has 
been at Manaos, the capital - of the State of 
Amazonas. As rubber is a forest product, nob 
raised by cultivation, there is considerable jea- 
lousy and rivalry between the merchants and 
exporting foreign houses at these places, and to 
some extent the jealousy is shared by the Gov- 
ernments of the two States, because there is a 
, tax of 23 per cent ad valorem on all exported 
rubber, payable to the State from which lb is 
exported. Both Brazil and Bolivia have claimed 
duty upon the rubber exported from the Acre 
district, and Bolivia, asserting sovereign rights 
over tlie territory, has granted a charter to a 
foreign syndicate for the exploitation of the 
district. An inconvenient consequence of the 
arrangement of it was that both the Brazilian 
and Bolivian Governments sought, as has been 
stated, 
6 
TO COLLECT DUTY UPON RUBBUR PRODUCRD OR 
COLLECTED IN TilE ACRE DISTRICT. 
It was to resisc these; double exactions that the 
inhabitants of the disputed territory in 1901 
took the bold course of setting up an independent 
Government, styled the Republic of the Acre, a 
course which ciiused so much ♦iss and dislocation 
ef trade in tiie State of Amazonas that the Presi- 
dent of the Republic was oflered and accepted 
£20,000 to dissolve his Government an l leave tne 
country. This he did, and he and his party made 
profits, which, however, have nothing to do with 
the present trouble. The history of the recent 
troubles iy this :— On the 6lh of Augu^;t, 1902, on 
the Xapury (C'hapury), a branch of the upper Acre 
river. PJacido de Cistro, formerly a clerk and 
super-cargo of the Amazon Steamship Company, 
began afresh revrdution, gathering adherents as 
he went. The revolutionary authority was vested 
in three representatives, so that if one or two were 
taken, the survivor could continue the struggile. 
After a few preliminary skirmishes, the first big step 
was the investment of Porto Acre by the insurgents. 
The besiegers numbered about 1,000, and the town 
was held by a small ga,iTison of Bolivian troops under 
the iHstricb governor. On October 23 the Governor 
wrote to the commander of the Acveanos, whom 
he addressed as "a friend, not as a revolutionary 
eneniy," thanking him for his treatment of the 
prisoners, and sending three open letters-^one 
for General Pando, President of Bolvia, one for 
the commanding officer of the captured force, 
and a private letter for his own wife. These 
were forwarded with the request that their bearer 
should be allowed to pass through the besiegers' 
lines and to communicate with the Bolivian 
Government and the rubber company which had 
an important trading station in the town. He 
was, however, promptly sent back. Shortly after- 
wards a party, sent to the besieged town by 
the rubber company, sought permission to pass 
through the lines, but these also were turned back 
a doctor only being allowed to join the garrison. 
Porto Acre, being the most important Bolivian 
liost in the Acre district, was well provisioned. 
As there was no sign of surrender in November or 
December, Placido de Castro gave the besieged 
notice on January 1.3 that he would attack shortly. 
On the 2-l:th a white flag was hoisted and terms of 
capitulation agreed upon. Three hundred of the 
inhabitants (amongst whom was a Boer) were sent 
to Manaos, where they arrived on February 5. 
Inhabitantsof the districtin a short time assisted 
as far as possible 
EXCEPT ONE PARTY OR EXPEDITION OF RUBBER- 
GATHERERS 
connected with Para. The number of the party 
was between one hundred and fifty and two hun- 
dred. The leader learnt that some Acreanos were 
at a " maloca," a depot or collection of huts 
thatched with palm leaves in which people live and 
rubber and provisions are stored. The occupants 
were called on to surrender, and refused. At 
the third summons the occupants shot and killed 
the nephew of the leader, who was standing by 
his side. Then the leader had a blazing arrow 
shot into the thatch. In a very few minutes the 
place was well alight ; the occupants were shot 
as they came out, and out of seventy-nve only 
nineteen got away. Porto Alouso havfng fallen, 
the Acreanos under Castro set out to meet the 
Bjlivian force, whereupon the Brazilian Govern- 
ment sent troaps to Ma^iaos with orders to prevent 
