I 34 
RUBBER PLANTING ON THE 
for Santa Rosa, but not over the trail by which I had come in. This 
time it was over a clear path, through the planted rubber trees, dipping 
down into the forest, and over a road with a soft carpet of matted leaves 
two or three feet deep, and as springy as if made of rubber — a new trail, 
and all on La Buena Ventura land. On reaching the railroad, we sent 
the horses back, and after waiting awhile, hoping for a train which 
might or might not run that day, we started to walk towards Santa 
Lucretia, where the new road joins the National Tehuantepec Rail- 
road. Walking a railroad track under any circumstances is hard work, 
but that track was certainly not made for tramps or actors. It had been 
hastily laid in the rainy season so as to make connection at Santa 
Lucretia, and infrequent and slow though the trains were, it was already 
a godsend to the planters and travelers. We knew, also, that as soon as 
the dry season came it would be straightened, ballasted, and put in 
shape. But its prospective virtues did not make the walking any easier. 
It was not altogether because the sleepers were laid at uneven distances, 
and often not spiked to the rails, or that the grass had grown up and 
covered both with a slippery tangle, nor was it the clayey mud that 
often rose flush with the rail tops, but it was the combination of all 
these that tired us out ere we had gone very far. Still, we had no 
thought of backing out, and so plodded steadily on, our packs on our 
shoulders, our feet clogged with mud, and wondering if luck would 
send the construction train to our assistance. But the trip was not 
without its compensations. The day was gorgeous, and my companion, 
botanist and enthusiast as he is, talked of the trees and plants in a way 
that would make one forget any sort of hardship. 
Speaking of the forest, one of the most conspicuous trees is a sort 
of a banyan, which has all the idiosyncrasies of that tree of many 
trunks, and grows to a great size. It is a species of Ficus which has 
not as yet been identified, but is probably the Ficus Benjamina. On 
tapping it gives a certain amount of latex, but of a very sticky nature, 
and probably of no value. There are also a great many mahogany 
trees, but in the former lumbering operations the larger of them have 
been cut out. and while there are many of them that would square per- 
haps twelve or fourteen inches, there are not so many which would go 
up to eighteen inches, the old time test. However, mahogany is so plen- 
tiful that many of the bridges across the streams on the forest trails 
are made of squared mahogany logs, one or two of them laid side by 
side, and mahogany furniture is very common in the planters’ home 
furnishings. There is considerable lignum vitce, and on the track we 
