BOTANICAL REPORT OF LIBERIA 523 
tirely absent, and the rubber trees (Hevea brasiliensis) are devoid of limbs for 
some distance up the length of the straight trunks. These factors, coupled with 
the regularity of planting, give the appearance of a well-kept forest park in 
which the crowns of the trees produce almost continuous shade. Here and there 
one sees the light V-shaped cuts on the trunks, indicating that tapping is still 
going on, since in most instances, at the bottom of the V’s white porcelain cups 
are suspended and into these drops the white, thick, milky latex. In the distance, 
passing among the trees with buckets suspended from yokes, the natives are 
seen going about their work of collecting the latex. The collections are then 

No. 408. — Method of tapping No. 409.— Early stage of black 
rubber trees thread blight. Cracking of tissue shown 
ata. Outer tissue removed to show black 
discoloration of wood at b 
taken to a rustic house in which the rubber is coagulated, eventually to come out 
in the form of a whitish lump of doughy material. This then is washed and put 
through a rolling mill, a process that removes the excess liquid and at the same 
time produces large sheets that resemble waffles. These are then dried and baled 
for shipment to America. 
When the period of latex production has about passed and, according to the 
overseer, the weather is wet, the cuts in the trees become infected with a fungus. 
The first symptom of the disease is the cracking in vertical lines of the cortex 
that remains after the outer layer is removed in tapping. Around the cracked 
lines there is a depressed area, underneath which the tissue is blackened. At the 
same time the cambium layer is killed to depth of a quarter of an inch. With 
