July 1, 1901.] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
21 
Cotninj? round to my side, where I guarded the 
only path out of the pool to possible freedom, he 
faced me quite undaunted and walked calmly ri»ht 
up to the point of my knife as I stood on a ledge of 
rock level with the water. I knew I could not reach 
his heart with my knife in this situation, even if I 
had pl"nj;ed straight in, and he did not consider it 
advisable to approach any nearer. A few hounds 
dashed in aeain and some of those still swimming 
tried to seize, so once more he swam across the 
pool. 
Wilson then made a second attempt, and this 
time the under current seemed to draw him 
down ; it was only by the greatest effort that he 
succeeded in clambering up to the ledge once 
more. 
Dainty, in spite of the wound on her shoulder 
she had received at the first short "bay" on the 
patana, here seized magnificently, and over and 
•ver again had the stag by. the ear, but the water 
was too rough for her. The stag would sink or 
even dive to choke her off, and invariably 
succeeded in doing so. Vestal, one of Venus's tine 
litter and almost a puppy, was barely a moment on 
the bank; and Blithesome and Keckless, two fox- 
hounds, went in over and over again most pluckily, 
but against them all the stag held his own most 
gallantly. We, too, were not idle, making a dash 
here and there as he seemed to expose him- 
self to attack ; but as often he eluded us. 
At last after an hour's fight Ross, taking an ad- 
vantage of a fine bit of eeizing by Vestal and 
Dainty in the shallow channel between the pool 
and the lower fall, got his kuife into the heart. 
Our quarry was a fine stag, and must have 
weighed fully 30st. clean ; a better fighter I have 
never seen. Having dragged the carcass ashore 
and performed the usual offices, the hounds were 
duly rewarded as they so well deserved. 
We now turned our attention to the wounded 
andmissing. Of the six hounds that had gone over 
the lower fall Venus, Beauty, and Eosebud had 
joined us. How any living creature could survive 
such a fall it was impossible to imagine ; but all 
three took part in the "bay" again, although it 
must be confessed with ardour somewhat damped 
by their descent into the pool below. 
Three hounds or more were still away and we 
feared the worst, but poor old Rover claimed 
our first attention. He seemed in a very bad 
way. indeed. While the " bay" was going on we 
uad noticed him for some time perched on a 
boulder shivering and taking no interest in the 
proceedings ; as we moved away to reach the open 
we realised how bad he was. He staggered and 
fell on his side, and seemed quite unable to move. 
A little whisky was poured down his throat, and 
he was at once carried to camp ; bub when we 
reached home an hour afterwards he was dead. 
Welkin, one of the fox-hounds, was badly pounded 
at the beginning -of the " bay." The stag had 
caught him fair on the back and temporarily 
injured his spine. lb was hours before he came 
round, and weeks before he could leave the kennel 
again. One or two others had bruises and slight 
wounds, but none of any consequence. Venus was 
iajured going over the bi^ f ill, and for l^sometime 
bhowed signs of injury. We found the rest of the 
missing ones shivering on the sides of the pool — 
two of them so placed that another plunge into it 
was ^necessary before they could reach us. 
CAOUTCHOUC PROM THE CONGO. 
WHENCE OBTAINED— PROTECTION AND FOREST 
CONSERVANCY — VARIETIES OP CAOUT- 
CHOUC — PREPARATION OP THE JUICE — 
PROPAGATION — MULTIPLICATION — 
PLANTING. 
(RUBBER.) 
Almost the whole of the caoulchouc exported 
from the Congo is obtained from climbing plants 
of the genus Landolphia, and some other Apocyna- 
ceous plants. Caoutchouc from some species of 
Ficus appears sometimes on the market. 
The authorities of the Congo State have wisely 
decided that so valuable a product as caoutchouc 
should be protected from the inroads of traders and 
of natives, and that the trees should be carefully 
cultivated. King Leopold signed, in January, 1900, 
the necessary documents for the institution of a 
" Service de Controle Forestier." 
This institution is of great importance from an 
economic point of vipw, and I may mention that 
the first results obtained by it have been highly 
satisfactory. 
According to the regulations it is ensured, under' 
the superintendence of this forest-service, that every 
individual who collects caoutchouc be by law 
obliged to propagate either the Lianas or the trees 
yielding the rubber, according to the discretion 
of the superintendent of the district. Therefore 
societies of growers (and they are numerous in the 
Congo States) have so well recognised the profit 
obtainable by working on a large scale, as the 
new State regulation requires, that they expect 
a bright future, and have despatched many special- 
ists simply to re-stock exhausted forests, and to 
increase the riches of the others. lb is cerbainly re- 
markable in colonial annals that a regulation, made 
in January, 1900, and c nfirmed in March, should 
not merely be in action within that year, but 
that importanb Liana plantations should within 
that short time be under the control of the ap- 
pointed agents. 
Already the plantations in the equatorial dis- 
trict (among others) include 3,000,000 of these 
Lianas. When in September, 1897, I left bhe 
Royal Gardens, Kew, for my duties in the Congo 
Sbabe, bhere was but little said concerning any 
extensive crops in equatorial Africa, except Coffee 
and Cocoa. Culbiyatioiis of Rubber-planbs has 
come up wholly in bhe last two or three years. 
VARIETIES OF CAOUTCHOUC. 
In Congo there are four very distinct caout- 
choucs of bhe Landolphia genus, besides the " des 
herbes" species (Carpodinus lanceolabus and Cli- 
taudra Henriquesiana, an allied genus), and three 
other species imperfectly determined. The '' des 
herbes " Caoutchouc is well-known. The diffi- 
culty of collecting the rubber, and the impurity 
of it, renders it of little use. The other species 
are quite distinct; the one is white, the second is 
black, the third is rosy. 
The white caoutchouc (called by the natives 
Matofeniongo, and by other names, according to 
the village in whose vicinity it is procured), is a 
vigorous Liana, whose stem rarely measures as 
much as a foot in diameter. The fruit is round, 
and from aboub the size of a green Walnut to that 
of a large Orange. The skin is thin, slighbly 
wrinkled, violeb when young, yellow-red or biight- 
red at maturity. The fruit contains from ten to 
thirty-two seeds, each surrounded by hairs, and 
