AND THE MALAY STATES 
21 
tapping on the plantations of the white men. Of course, once they have 
the rubber, it is impossible to prove title to it. 
In chatting with Director Willis, it was easy to see that he was 
enormously interested in the success of the Hevca experiments in Ceylon, 
and, indeed, in the whole of the East, and that he was doing much to 
further them. That the whole of the tropical world in the East was fully 
alive to the opportunity that rubber offers, he acknowledged. The 
botanic gardens at Peradeniya, and the plantations as well, are constantly 
receiving visitors from Java, Sumatra, French Indo-China, Siam, and 
similar countries, who are investigating the subject, and often trying to 
contract for seed on the spot. 
As the oldest planting of Hevea rubber in the island is at Henerat- 
goda gardens, which is one of the government gardens, under the direct 
charge of Mr. Willis, he thought that my plan to go there first was a 
good one, and at once gave me a letter to the contractor in charge, Mr. 
William Perira. 
On the following morning, therefore. I had coffee at 4.30, and took 
a ‘‘rickshaw” to the railway station, and ere long was speeding along 
the seacoast toward my destination. The rising sun disclosed long 
stretches of swamp and jungle, stretches of sandy shore crowded with 
cocoanut palms, native villages just awakening, fishing villages where 
the whole population was engaged in pulling nets that had been filling 
up all night, and in time we reached the railway station at Heneratgoda. 
Here as I could get neither gharri nor rickshaw, I was obliged to charter 
a bullock “hackery.” 
