2 39 
conditions does not obtain, it is common to see wounds right down to 
the wood. The results of bad tapping will be noticeable in about four 
years’ time when the irregularly renewed surface comes to be tapped 
again; the tapping will then be very difficult to carry out and still 
more difficult to carry out without again increasing the damage. Some 
of the oldest trees in various places in the Federated Malay States are 
an object lesson in what may be accomplished by bad tapping; little 
blame can be attached to the original workers, who had to learn by 
experience how to tap and how not to; but estates with trees now 
being tapped for the first time should profit by others’ experiences, as 
upon the quality of the present tapping a good deal of their future 
prosperity will depend. I strongly recommend that all wounds to 
the wood in tapping be immediately painted with cold coal tar. This 
draws attention to bad tapping and saves attack by wound-fungi and 
borers. 
Overtapping, especially of young trees, is another procedure to 
be avoided, though still too common doubtless owing to the high price 
of rubber. No system that does not provide a four years’ renewal of 
the bark can be described as sound, and I think this is recognised by 
most planters, although some may not be able from various reasons 
to adopt such a system. 
The manufacture of rubber may best be described as still in the 
experimental stage, neither buyers nor sellers knowing sufficiently the 
kind of rubber that is best for manufacturing purposes. What is 
most wanted in the industry is a simple and reliable test for the 
strength of rubber as it leaves the plantation factory, comparable ta 
the polariscope test for sugar; I may add that such test is, so far as I 
can tell, not in sight, and rubber now can only be judged by colour 
and general appearance, until after it has been vulcanized. At present 
there seems to be preference for smoked rubber, and many estates are 
contemplating the erection of smoke houses and will be turning out 
smoked sheet largely in place of the hitherto favoured crepe. The smoke 
houses are usually two-storied, the rubber being hung, as taken from 
the rollers, in the upper, while fires are kept going below; openings 
of various sizes and descriptions are made in the floor between 
the two stories. Cocount husks form about the best fuel obtainable 
in large quantities, and it is quite probable that estates which have 
coconuts planted up as a secondary crop will find them of great value 
for this purpose alone, as the demand for husks will increase con- 
siderably in the next few years. The movement appears to be quite 
a sound one, as there is little doubt that properly smoked rubber is 
actually stronger and better than unsmoked, apart from all temporary 
fashionable demands. 
Two fungoid diseases of rubber alone call for mention: root 
disease due to Fomes semitostus, and die-back due to Thyridaria 
( Diplodia ) tarda. These with other diseases are treated more fully in 
the report of the Mycologist appended. Root disease is very com- 
monly present in plantations and is responsible for a considerable 
