SB,Z9l SB 291 .14 P4 Copy 1 RUBBER THE HANDMAID OF CIVILIZATION By EDWARD W. TRRRY cor YRtGHTED BY HARRY WII.KIN PKRRY THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, Two Copies Received JUL 28 1903 Copyright Entry CUSi d. XXc.No. COPY B. 6\^ REVIvSED RDITION XOTK The chapter given in the following pages is from a work en- titled : "Tropical Amkrica : Its Planters and Planta- tions," now in preparation. Sports Afidd said of the author : *' Probably no American is more competent to write of the conn- try life than is this author, who, because of his long-trained habits of observation, careful search for the bottom facts and weighing of details, of deducing therefrom the essentials and presenting them clearly and concisely, has made the best possible use of his time ard experience." A very successful tropical plantation company says of the following treatise on Rubber and its cultivation : " Wishing to furnish our stockholders and friends the most reliable and con- ser\-ative statement of the facts relating to the production of rub- ber and.the,progress.Ayl\ifiiJia5ibeeu.uiii'^le jr.its cultivation, we have sec\frf^V3)(.;rji2is*>»i«)i/1:j)niseJthe wijljinj cjiapter from ' Tropi- cal America*'.* \t covers fl*e*s*ufjject*i*' a scholarly and trustwor- thy manqeriip, to. tjie^'^r.i^po.j.' CHAPTER IV. Caucho, IwOng a mere pIvAything of the; ancient American, now the Handmaid op Civiliza- tion, BRINGS WEALTH AND LUXURY TO MODERN LIFE. L,oug before Spain's soldiers and priests brought to the New World the gentle teachings of cross and of sword, American aristocrats played ball. They drove through rings of stone, standing out from sculp- tured walls, globes made from the milk of trees which to this hour bear their ancient Aztec name of hule. Such trees were known in South America, also, and there their gum was named caucho, which is by those to the manor born called " cahoocho ;" but by Eng- lish tongues- it is called rubber, for no reason other than that, when first it became known in Britain, al- most its onl}' use was the rubbing out of pencil marks. More than three hundred j-ears passed after Span- ish conquistador first saw hule used in America, before the conservative Old World wanted more of it than a few small cubes, and those to correct its errors. As lately as three generations ago Great Britain used only 50,000 pounds in the 3'ear, and doubtless thought that a large quantity. Then a devoted Yankee sacrificed himself, his famih', and all he could control, to make rubber really useful to mankind. His devotion won success in 1844, and made immortal the name of Good- vear. 4 SOME USES OE GUM ELASTIC He who has curiosity enough about the uses to which rubber is put nowadays, may get some idea of them by looking into shop windows in any town of any size. Or he may call to mind the fact that he may bathe in a tul) of rulil^er, and rub himself down in his bath with a device also made of caucho; then step on a mat, a tile or other floor-covering of the same gum. He may dress his hair with comb and brush, and fasten his clothes with buttons all of rubber, then eat his breakfast with the aid of knife and fork having han- dles of the same material. The gloves with which the dainty housewife will protect her hands, when she herself washes the china that is too precious to trust to another, are of that elastic substance. Feet by millions are shod on rainy days with the waterproof caucho ; and thousands of other feet in ditch and in mine, in forest and in Ijrook, and in many of the tasks men set themselves to do in mud, and snow, and flood, are saved from wet and resulting ills, 1 y boots made of hule. Gossa- mer, waterproofed by rubber, drapes tender girls and thicker cloth of rubber protects rugged drivers and their teams, and sturd}' sailors and soldiers from rain and sleet and snow. In camp and on trail the rubber blanket and the rubber bed keep men from the damp- ness of the ground. It cushions the heels on which men tramp, and the wheels on which they glide. It holds the ink with which tb.ey n:ake their mark on the scroll of fame, and snugly binds letters and holds bills and other unpleasant things. With rubber the sur- geon covers wounds and tlie dentist dair.s tlie mouths of victims. Rubber pads the feet of fl>ing trotters. WHAT IS INDIA RrBBp;R 5 and makes springy cushions of the wheels of that jug- gernaut which threatens soon to override the last claims of the horse to place in the economics of mankind. Cyclopedias and dictionaries tell the reader that rubber is an elastic, gummy substance, the thickened juice of various plants, mainly of three families, the Apocinaceas, the Euphorbacias, and the Urticaceas ; that pure rubber in thin sheets is whitish and half transparent ; that it is the most elastic of all known substances ; that its elasticity may be removed by stretching and keeping it in cold water, and may be restored by putting it into warm water ; that cold makes it hard and stiff, but never brittle; heat makes it supple, and if that heat rises to 248 degrees P'ahr. , the gum melts, and evaporates if the heat rises to 600 de- grees Fahr. ; that it dissolves in bisulphide of carbon, naphtha and benzol, in washed ether, chloroform and the oils of cajeput and lavender, of sassafras and tur- pentine ; that when treated with sulphur, as in vulcan- izing, india rubber becomes black, horny and brittle, and that since the process of vulcanizing was discovered by Goodyear, pure rubber has been rarely used, the vulcanized being better for nearly every purpose for which rubber is required. The milky juice of the bark of rubber trees is quite distinct from the sap which circulates through the wood. Each of more than sixty kinds of trees, shrubs and xdnes give elastic gum useful in the arts and sciences, and ha\nng generally the chief characteristics of hule or of the caucho of Para. They are widely distributed over a belt that reaches around the world, and has a width of forty-five degrees of latitude, or 6 WHAT VARIETIES OE RUBBER THERE ARE from Madagascar, about twenty-five degrees south of the equator, to Vera Cruz, in Mexico, near the twenty- third degree north — a girdle more than three thousand miles in breadth. Naturally plants of so great a varie- ty, scattered over so wide a range of latitude, differ in habitat, in habits, and in rate of growth, in length of life, in amount and quality of the milk thev yield and the age at wdiich they begin giving it in paying quan- tities. Some of these ^neld enough of the precious gum to richly reward toilsome search through forests that are often for weeks vast seas of .yellow waters of South America's greatest river; through death-dealing swamps of Africa, steaming jungles of India, and moist cool hillsides of Central America and of Mexico. Pittier says in a series of articles on caucho, that there are no less than fifteen species of Ficns the milk of w^hich has not been examined, and an infinite num- ber of vines of the Aporinaceas which give milk. " That is, there remains here a vast field open to intel- ligent investigation, and which may by well conducted experiments give profitable results." Of the more noteworthy varieties of plants which yield elastic gum, are the Urceoln escidenta, of Burma; the Hancornia speciosa or mangabeira, indigenous to Brazil; Sajjium birjhiruJulofiuiit of Columbia; Manihot glaziovii, or ceara rubl^er; F icus elast ica, of East India; Tabernaemontana, Hevea braziliensis and CastUloaelas- tica, of America. Balata comes from Guiana, is inferior to and sells for much less than the price of Brazilian and Central American rubber, which it is used to adulterate. An American consul sa\s of the cultivation of balata: SOMETHING OF ITS COST 7 " That the industry can be made a very profitable one is seen in the price paid for the rubber, which varies, in Paris from three to eight francs (57 cents to $1.54) per kilogram (2.246 pounds), according to qualit}'. It is evident, therefore, that while industrial enterprise is lying under a cloud in vSouth America, it ma}^ be to the interest of capitalists to turn these resources to ac- count, the more so as rubber is one of those things which are not likely to suffer depreciation to such an extent as to make the production unremunerative." The average cost of balata rubber of the Guianas is said to be: Price paid to the gatherer, per pound So 20, or 50 per cent. Coimnissioiis paid to overseers 02, or 5 per cent. General expenses and management oS, or 20 per cent. I,osses through bad debts 10, or 25 per cent. Total cost per pound Jo 40 100 per cent. In the ' ' bad debts ' ' mentioned are included ad- vances to laborers for outfits and working expenses — "grub-stakes," as the}^ would be termed in mining parlance. Of such losses United vStates Consul Keiine- d}-, of Para, said thatfoutof a hundred such employees to whom such advances were made, at least .seventy- five per cent, die, de.sert or return to their homes be- cause of illness.^ Advances made to them are a dead loss. The mangabeira grows on the arid lands of Brazil, e.specially on the plains we.st of Sao Paulo. It extends from 46° to 48° west of Greenwich, and 21' to 23° .south from the equator. It requires little soil, will not thrive on moist lands, and takes four to five j^ears to reach its full development, when it is about twelve feet in height and has a spread of branches of about eight feet. After 8 AMERICAN RUBBER TREES the fifth year the bleedings begin, and the 3-iekl of milk is large. It is calculated that the average yield per tree is one kilo (344 oz.), but five kilos (11 pounds) each have been obtained from mavgobeira trees standing on ground especially favoralile to their growth. The greyish-black gum exudes a yellow fluid which, if not carefully removed, damages the quality. It is said that losses from that cause are about twent}' per cent, of the market value of the gum. Saphon bighnuhiloi^uin is indigenous to the Guia- nas, to Venezuela and to Colombia. It is said that hun- dreds of thousands of pounds of gum of this species were exported from the neighborhood of Bogota in the years 1880 to 1885. The species is represented in Costa Rica, mainly at altitudes between 1,000 and 2,800 me- ters (3,281 and 9,180 feet), according to Prof. Pittier. He quotes a statement that bigkmdulosiim has been exterminated in Colombia, and asks whether this was necessary to obtain its milk. In all parts of Central America Tabernaemontana exists, usually as shrubs of little height, branching near the ground. Bark, twigs, leaves and fruits give an abundance of white milk. Five species are known to Costa Rica, growing in altitudes of 1,000 to 1,300 meters (3,281 to 4,265 feet). The deadly swan:ps of the Dark Continent furnish the rubber of Kicks id africcno, which grows to a height of fifty to sixty feet, and yields a fair quality of gum. The chief supply of African rubber comes, however, from creepers and vines of the genus Landolphia. Af- rica has roots and tubers, also, which give rubber in paying quantities. OTHKR KINDS OK RUBBER TREES 9 That plant of thick and glossy leaf which stands on northern lawns in summer and adorns our rooms in winter is Ficus elastica, a native of Indian jungles. There the parent trunk rises, upheld by thin roots that creep out upon the surface of the ground in devious ways, and look as if they had flowed from the ribbed bole and stiffened in serpentine courses. From the limbs drop thin branches which thicken into new trunks and together hold up one broad, leafy dome, as does its better known cousin, Ficus indica, the banj-an tree. Ficns elastica is of a multitudinous family, and is sa slow of growth that fourteen or more years must pass before it can become large enough or strong enough to recover from " tapping " or " bleeding. ' ' It has been cultivated in Kast India, where the government has forests that produce, it is said, an average of about thirteen pounds per tree. There are in moist and hot regions of America varieties of Ficus, better known as matapalo or ' ' kill- tree," which begin life as vines that, starting from some limb of a tall tree, grow downward, until their rootlets, which are bunched at the ends, touch the ground. There the}- catch hold, sink into the soil and begin drawing food from the earth. In time the}' en- wrap tightly and soon choke to death the tree whicli gave them their first support. The trunks of the vine in time become a shell which coffins their murdered nurse and foster mother, and hides from sight her ruined body. The Heveas give to the world the best rubber known. They are a purely American branch of the family EupJiorbiaccas, and have in vSouth America eight TO THE TRKK That gives para gum well-kuown members. The rubber of Para comes from Hevea braziliensis, which grows to goodly height and thickness. Its trunk is smooth, branches long, leaves alternate, generally composed of three parts, flowers small and usually of one .sex only, in bunches growing at the end of the new branches. The seeds are large, smooth and lengthened. Two or three seeds are found together in a single capsule. In America the hule of the Aztec, the Gastilloa elastka of the scientist, is found in all latitudes from 3° south to 20° north. In Colombia it seems to exist west only of the Sierra de Merida, and in Ecuador it appears on the Pacific slopes alone. The altitude at which it thrives varies in different countries. In Costa Rica it grows at a height of 800 meters (2,625 feet), and Pit- tier is of the opinion that there its middle altitude may be about five hundred meters. Hulc is named Gastilloa elastica also, and is of kin with that weed common to roadside and pasture of the North, and known to many a thousand boys who have felt mightily stuck up because their fingers pulled apart its pods stuffed with seeds and silk, or broke stem or leaf, and dabbed on things the gummy milk that flowed in thick and creamy drops. Few of those boys, or of their elders for that matter, knew that the juice of the common milkweed is very like that of the latex trees of the tropics which give the rubber that saves us from many a hard rub, and shock of blow and of noise, and in other wa3-s helps to make modern life endurable. The common hule that gives the rubber of com- merce in Costa Rica is not the true Gastilloa elastica, but is the Gastilloa costaricensis. Hule macho of Costa CASTII^LOA ELASTICA II Rica is seemingly identical with the tuno of Honduras, which Herasley has named Gastilloa tunoi. In Costa Rica the favorite habitat of hule, or Gastilloa elastica, is an altitude of loo to 700 meters (330 to 2,300 feet) above sea-level, the best developed trees being found as high as 300 meters. In the low plains near the coasts, and in altitudes higher than 700 meters, hule becomes scarce. Five hundred meters may be regarded as its higher average level for all Central America and south- ern Mexico; but hule is not a tree of the lower plains. Its upper limit in Guatemala is said by Sapper to be about 400 meters. It will not thrive where the mer- cury sinks below 15° centigrade. That variety called T. Donell-SmithU, seen by Dr. Reuss in Salvador, was found by Senor Tonduz in Buenos Ayres in 1892, and by Cooper and Donell-Smith in Santa Clara, Costa Rica, where it is frequently seen in the forests and on the banks of the rivers. The fruits, cut into small pieces, quickly give a large quan- tity of milk which, when boiled with water, coagulates in a yellowish mass that little by little takes a more decidedly yellowish color. This gum becomes some- what brittle after two or three months have passed. It has been found that a coating of this gum protected perfectly copper wire immersed in salt water. It is thought, therefore, that it is as valuable as is gutta percha. From forest trees of those countries comes nearly all the gum elastic required by a multitude of indus- tries, and by the demands of health, comfort and luxury those industries ser\^e; requirements so many, so varied 12 DESTRUCTION OF THE SOURCE OF SUPPIA' and often so unobtrusive that one can scarcely count the half without much research. Although great forests exist in which rubber trees are indigenous, there are no rubber forests, and but few groves of such trees. They are, as a rule, found stand- ing singly. It is, therefore, necessary to give much time to hunting, and labor to gathering their product. Few trees have been planted to take the place of the great number destroyed by the gatherer, although the careful studies of skilled observers have left no doubt that cultivating rubber trees will be most profitable. Destruction of rubber trees goes on with complete disregard for every interest involved. So far from at- tempting to save the trees, as a source of future rev- enue, the native rubber gatherer resents every endeavor to preserve this source of riches, and wantonly destroj^s the trees which give him his living. He prefers to seek new hunting grounds rather than to use a little care in saving the trees he finds. The more prudent of them usually gashes only one side of a tree, then leaves it for a few months to recover in part. Then he again slashes it on the side opposite that where his first hack- ings were. This finishes that tree. The two series of cuts will girdle the trunk completely in a dozen or less places, and of course they kill it. In some countries, as Ecuador, the natives simply cut down the rubber tree, and thus at once cut off further supplies from that source. In Central America many gatherers, when they find an untapped tree, make a ladder of lianas or vines which hang from many of the trees near, and are as tough and strong as whipcord. Across these they lash HOW RUBBER IS GATHERED 1 3 short bits of wood, and by their help easily climb to the branches of the hule. Huleros who are clever have such steel ' ' climbers ' ' as aid linemen to ascend tele- graph and other poles. With such things fastened to their feet, uleros — the "h" isleft out of Spanish speech, and so may be dropped from English print — walk up the smooth, blue-gray trunk of the tree, and begin making cuts from which the milk quickly flows. Many another ulero makes, with rope or flexible vines, a loop around the bole and" his own body, presses his bare soles against the bark, swings forward swift- ly and as quickly tosses the loop upward, settles his body back against the rope, hitches his feet upward on the trunk, again tosses the loop, and so on until the lower limbs have been reached. The rest is easy. Once at the lower branches, the ulero cuts with his machete a notch through the bark and into the wood. This notch may be from half an inch to an inch wide, and slopes at a sharp angle which, with a similar notch cut in the other quarter of the trunk, makes a big V. About two feet below this he cuts another V, and then another and another pair of gashes, lower and yet lower until the feet of the w'ood butcher rest on the ground. As he descends he draws a line, with finger wet in the sap, from the meeting of the first pair of cuts downward to the last, that the milk may follow instead of spreading over the surface of the bark. In the junction of the lower V he may stick a bit of stiff leaf, or mayhap a piece of that thin-walled bam- boo called cariso. Beneath that stands whatever ves- sel the ulero may have to catch the milk. Some carr>^ 14 MAKING CUM FROM THE MILK with them tin cups with one side flattened to fit against the tree. Many are well content with less costly and elaborate measures, and cut with a single clip of the machete a length of cariso, which they set up beneath the spout stuck in the side of the tree. In al)out an hour the milk ceases flowing. Some uleros empty the carisos into such vessels as they have brought to hold the gathering of tlie day ; but many another digs in the soil a little pit, then looks about for that moonplant which scientists have named Calonyctyon sjjeciosum. PVom this he cuts lengths enough, batters them between stones, washes out the juice in a pan and with it wets the sides and "bottom of his pit, so that none of the rubber milk shall soak into the earth. He pours his collection into the. pit, and then adds the juice of the vine. The instant the two liquids mingle the milk becomes a spongy, elastic, chalk-colored mass or mat. This he usually stores in some brook. This method is much quicker and easier than is smoking the gum in thin films over a fire, with eyes smarting well for one's pains, which, it is said, ofttimes causes blindness. There is the further advantage, sel- dom forgotten by the ulero, and never out of the i 'nd of the buj^er, that " mat " made in pits and stored in brooks is well preserved by abundant water, with per- chance a little earth from the walls of the pit to lend weight. These make- weights might add to the sum the honest ulero gets from the buyer, if the latter did not know the tricks of the trade. In some cases the rubber milk is left in pits in the ground until the water filters awaj- in part, and is in part evaporated, leaving the gum. This can be done BETTER WAYS FOR JIAKING RUBBER I5 in the dry season onh*. Another way is to mix the sap with a little water, and let it stand for days to co- agulate. The mat is squeezed and worked to expel much of the water, and is afterward dried in smoke or in shade. Sometimes alum is used, or salt, or an acid, and the gum is afterward pressed and dried. Or four to eight quarts of water are added to each quart of the milk, and allowed to stand until the rubber rises like cream. This is washed repeatedly and dried slowh' , or is smoke-dried. Or the watery parts are permitted to dry away and leave the rubber, shallow vessels being used to hold the milk. All these methods are crude, costly and unsatisfactory. Better ways have been discovered, and it is more than likeh^ that improvements will be made on these discoveries. The Trinidad Botanical Gardens published in its bulletin of April, i8g8, an account of an opera- tion by which a machine on exhibition there separated in two minutes the rubber from the milk of a Castilloa tree or hule. In three hours that gum became sheets or mats of rubber of fine marketable qualit}'. It was f;'ee,from the usual quantity of proteid and albuminoid matter which is in rubber made by the usual processes. Machines made for this purpose are said to have given satisfaction, after years of experience. In its Circular No. 4 the Royal Botannical Gardens of Ceylon con- firms the statement that b}^ a centrifugal machine like that used in making butter, there was prepared, in a few minutes and at little cost, caucho absolutely pure and without odor or risk of decomposition. Herea grows rapidly where the temperature never goes much below 75° Farenheit (24^ centigrade), and l6 THE RUBBER TREE OF PARA •where the soil is rich and moist. .In such situations it will reach a height of thirty feet in two j-ears, and in many cases attains a height of fifty feet and a diameter of twenty-five inches in eight 3^ears. Para rubber comes from the vast valley of the Amazon, where Hevea braziliensis grows in lowlands which are, during many weeks of each year, a great swirling sea of mud- dy water. There Indians clad in their native modesty roam, and with. little hatchets notch -the -bark >-of the Hevea, stick against it tiny cups of clay to catch the drip, and when the flow has stopped, collect these cup- fuls and carry the milk in an earthen jar slung in a net of twisted bark, to the camp or other place where the curing is to be done. There the Indian makes a fire of the greasy nuts of the uricura palm, and puts over it a funnel or chimney of earthenware, to concentrate the smoke. Then he dips into the pan of rubber milk by the side of the fire a stick or paddle, and turns it over and over in the thick smoke. Again and again he does this, until the mat of gum weighs perhaps twenty-five pounds. This the Indian cuts open and hangs up to dry more thoroughly. Gum thus made is free from twigs and other rubbish, and has all pos- sible elasticity. Possibly because it is so prepared the gum of the Amazon is the most highly prized of all rubber. That from other sources might, perhaps, Tdc as good if as carefully and honestly treated. The wasteful methods described are commonly followed. They are destroying rapidly the natural sources of supply, while the demand is increasing rap- idly. These facts make a strong argument in favor of planting rubber trees to take the place of those in the The united states studies rubber \j forest. For it has long been manifest that reckless ways of treating the rulsber supply must soon destroy that source of wealth and comfort. As no satisfactory success has rewarded experi- ments of inventors and chemists who have long been searching for a substitute for rubber, great anxiety has been created by the destruction of the trees. This feel- ing caused the United vStates Department of vState to ask its consuls, in iSgo, for such information as they could get relating to the supply of rubber trees, to the treatment given to them, and other points of impor- tance bearing on the subject. The principal questions were : " Will there V)e a shortage in the supply of crude rubber?" " Is the rubber tree susceptible of cultivation ?" " Is rubber-growing profitable?" The replies to these queries indicate that the sup- ph^ of india rubl^er in accessible regions is diminishing, while the demand for it is increasing steadily.^ The consul-general at INIexico has written that "the Indians, in order to gain as much as possible of the juice at one time, often strip the bark from forest trees yielding the gitm, or make such frequent incisions that the trees soon die. In fact, they are constantly destroying those valuable trees which by rational treatment would yield right along." The United States consul at Costa Rica said that " It is certain that the methods used have been so improvident and destructive as to almost extin- guish the sources of stipply in those regions which for- merly produced the greatest quantity of this valuable article of commerce. ' ' Dr. Enrique Pittier, Director of the Institute of Physical Geography of Costa Rica, a. l8 DESTRUCTION OF RUBBER TREES painstaking student, says in the Boletin de Agricultura Tropical : " Our forests of liule, ineffectually protected b}^ laws well known to be dead letters, are miserably ruined to such an extent that on all the Pacific slope, from the volcano of Orosi to Punta Burica, a territory in which twenty years ago the beautiful Castilloas abounded, it is to-day difficult to find one. Soon we shall be able to say the same of the seemingly inex- haustible forests of the valley of the San Juan and of Talamanca and the other great valleys of the north." A like condition of affairs has long existed in Nicara- gua and Honduras. The people of those countries feel that the spontaneous products of nature belong to any one who will take them, and that laws designed to pro- tect the rubber trees are tyrannical. The India Rubber World says that there are just so many millions of caucho trees in South America, and that it is possible, by cutting down more of these each year, to increase the production of rubber of this kind. But the faster this is done the earlier will come the end. There will be such a decline in production as is show^n by the figures which are given in the next paragraph. And not in South America alone do such conditions exist. The rubber yield of Assam has fallen off; almost no Madagascar rubber now comes to mar- ket; there is marked decline in the production of Acra, Lagos and Benguela rubbers, and a like condition is predicted for the Congo Free State. In all the regions mentioned the sole mode of obtaining rubber is by de- stroying completely the trees which supply this gum. The same authority has published records which show that during the years 1855 to 1875, Colombia ex- COIvOMBIA'S SUPPLY DISAPPEARING I9 ported 51,332,402 pounds of gum, the average annual increase having been 1,227,061 pounds through the twenty years, and the greatest increase having been during the last five years of that period, when the j-early average increase was 2,331 ,346 pounds. From that time the falling off was rapid, averaging 898,391 pounds for twent3--five years, during all of which quarter of a cen- tur}- only 43,292,343 pounds were exported by that re- public. Her average annual production of gum for the 45 j-ears mentioned was 2,102,772 pounds, and the aver- age for the last five years was 1,256,825 pounds less than that. If the shrinkage in production should con- tinue at the rate of the last five 3-ears, Colombia will export no rubber in and after the year 1907. In the 3'ears 1894 to 1900, both included, the ex- ports of gum from Para and IManaos aggregated 349,- 347,495 pounds. During that time the volume of ex- ports increased, each 3'ear, except in 1S97, when i ,269,- 443 pounds less were shipped than were exported the previous year. The difference between exportations of 1894 and 1900 amounted to 16,038,41 2 pounds. Of the whole amount 173,102,598 pounds came to the United States, and 176,244,897 pounds went to Europe. The Revue Coloniale, published b}' the Ministrj- of Colonies of France, is quoted as saving that a gang, attracted solely by hopes of immediate gain, destroj-ed all the Jlfaugaheira trees, j^oung as well as old, of a large district in Brazil. The consul-general of the United vStates, at Guatemala, wrote of the Castilloas of that republic: "Owing to the destructive manner which has been emploj-ed to obtain their valua1)le 20 FOREST RUBBER TREES KILLED EVER\'\VHERE gum, they are rapidly disappearing. There have been various attempts made by the Guatemalan government to prevent the destruction of the.se trees, and to encourage the planting of more." And the then consul at Managua reported that " The natural supply of India rubber yearly decreases in Nicaragua. The cause of this is the habit of the natives, until lately, of cutting down the trees, thinking that they could thus secure more milk. The government attempts no su- pervision of the forests; any one may cut the trees, and great destruction is going on among them, through the young ones being tapped as well as the full-grown ones." A consul who wrote of the trade in Brazil, said: " If but three gashes per day are made in the bark of the rubber tree, and the hatchet in the hands of the careless native does not penetrate or strike the wood, the tree does not appear to suffer from the treatment, except that the trunk grows thick, and the scarred sur- face becomes irregular and bumpy. It will continue to grow, however, in good health, and yield milk in abiuidance for thirty or forty ^-ears. If the blow from the hatchet wounds the wood, the tree dies. It will thus be seen how very easily the destruction of almo.st * inexhaustible ' forests may be completed. For this reason very many of the once*' inexhaustible ' rubber swamps of the lower Amazon are already wholly or partially abandoned, and the same fierce on.slaughts are being made now upon the virgin swamps of the upper tributaries." Many quotations might be made, all tending to show that reckless destruction of rubber trees for gener- CASTILLOA ELASTICA THE CHIEF HOPE 21 ations has been going on in nearly all rubber-producing countries. Several governments have tried to stop, and some have in a small measure checked, the de- struction. They have forbidden the slashing of the trunks; but, as uleros work in wilds remote from the ken of the authorities, and as local officials are some- times under the iniluence of uleros and traders, it scarcely is astonishing that little has been accom- plished. Certain governments have forbidden all ex- portation of rubber from forest trees, during long periods; but as adjoining states permitted the gather- ing of forest rubber during the same period, the result has been that uleros and traders smuggled across the boundary lines the gum they had gathered in prohibi- ted districts. Thus a country which has tried to pre- serve this most vakiable source of revenue for its peo- ple not only failed in that purpose, but it lost export duties it might have got from rulDber taken from its own trees. While Indians were recklessly cutting off, at the source, supplies wliich gave them their living, sev- eral causes comliined to increase the demand for the gum at the other end of the line of trade. Of all rubber-bearing trees, liule is best known by people of those parts of the New World that lie north of BraziL Much and thorough study has been given to its habits, requirements and capacity. In this the English seem to have led, and the Germans to have followed closely. From those studies the deductions reached appear to be that the Cast ill oa requires, above all else, good shade on moist, deep and well drained soil. These conditions are best found among tall for- 22 WHAT PLANTERS HAVE DONE est trees, on hillsides, or at least on rolling ground. It seems to liave been established that trunks and branches of hule exposed to the rays of the sun suffer a change in their bark, and that this adversely affects the flow of milk. Theodore F. Koschny, of San Carlos, Costa Rica, says that the " Cast ill oa elof^tica is a shade tree, and any ciilture other than that which suits this character- istic will pro\-e a failure. It will grow in the open until about the sixth 3'ear, when the top begins to dry off, and shoots start from the lower stump to protect the trunk. It is the stem of the tree that needs pro- tection from the sun's rays. Trees not protected will perish from the first attempt to extract rubber. I have lost thovisands of trees at the first tapping for this rea- son." Koschnj' planted rubber .seeds in the forest after cutting out the larger trees where the shade was densest. Four 3'ears later the trees were twenty-five feet in height and five inches in diameter three feet above the ground. He says that while this rubber tree is so delicate in the open field, it is quite the reverse in the forest. Some have set hule trees among bananas, where they grew luxuriantly while well shaded; but after the tops of the hules passed those of the bananas, the growth was slow and the ultimate result unsatisfacto- ry. Plantations of rubber thus made have been aban- doned. Swampy lands and others lacking drainage seem unfit for the cultivation of hule. In such .situa- tions the trees may make rapid growth, their foliage EXPERIENCE WITH CASTILEOA 25 be abundant and fresh, but the Hfe of the tree will be short and the milk poor in gum. Alberto Fait & Co., owners of an hacienda on the Pacific side of Costa Rica, saj^: " The experiments we have made in planting hule, and the results obtained thus far, are not in accord with those indicated in the Boletin de Agricultura. Permit us to describe the state of our plantation, without comment nor idea of contradicting persons acquainted with the suliject. " I. ^^'e have hule planted among coffee, and this is the best: in two years it has attained a height of two meters (seventy-nine inches), and a circumference of twenty-two cm., (8.6 inches^ "2. We have hule in the sun, but surrounded by the forest; and this also promises w^ell. "3. That which is in the forest and little acces- sible to sunshine has lost much. ' ' From all which it appears that in this place, 600 meters (1970 feet), a little more or less, above the level of the sea, on land formed of volcanic detritus and much vegetable mold, and where it rains with some frequency, air and sunshine are indispensable for hule, which needs shade in its first ^-ears only." The Boletin comments on the foregoing as follows: * ' We understand that the plants on the Lombardia hacienda are of little age: so we cannot admit the ad- vantage of growing hule and coffee together. Both are plants of surface roots, and require almost the same food elements. Coffee is a mere shrub, but hule be- comes a bulky tree. It will greatly damage coffee by exhausting the soil. Neither is its shade on the coffee ■24 SEEDING OE CASTItLOA ^vithout bad effect. With or without reason, hule has the credit of being very exhausting, and the authors who have treated of the subject are unanimous in con- demning hule in cafetals, and in plantations of cacao." Seeds of the hule mature from March to July, according to location. Their power of germination is short lived. They grow to a size rather larger than a -cherry pit, or to that of a large pea, and are covered with a mucilaginous substance. Birds and animals eat these seeds with gu.sto, a fact which tends strongly to keep down the number of wild hule trees. After gath- ering the seeds the}^ should be kept in water, not longer than four or five days, initil planted. Koschny likens the fruit of the hule to a pie three or four inches in diameter, on a green plate. " Its pulp is soft ai..'. red, having eight to fifteen seeds. When fresh one thou- sand seeds weigh a pound; by the end of the third day 1,500 will be required to make a pound." From some of this evidence it appears that the ■simplest and safest is also the cheapest w^ay to plant rubber. In that method the planter digs a small spot where the tree is to stand, and there puts a .seed two or three centimeters deep. Some argue that quicker results may be got by setting cuttings in places thus prepared. Such cuttings should be taken from the matured branches of the hule. Others assert that trees .so obtained do not grow as tall nor of as good shape as those from seed grow. When planted in the forest the trees should be four meters apart, giving 625 per hectare, and should be protected by stakes. Of many who have given evidence as to the rela- tive merits of various rubber trees for cultivation the YIEI^n OF CUM FROM CASTIIXOA 25 greater iiuiulier have decided that CastiUoa is best. It seems to be suited to a greater range of temperature and altitude than most others, is propagated as easily as any, gives as much and as good gum as any other gives, with the possible exception of Hevea hraz'diensis or Para, and requires no more care in cultivation, har- vesting or treatment of its milk than is wanted by anj- other. For wet lands Para is imdoubtedly superior to CastiUoa, therefore it is thought that Hevea will thrive in the low lands of parts at least of Central America, and may give good results as far north as the region of Tehauntepec. Of hule trees John Crawford, of Nicaragua, says in the X". S. Consular Reports: " vSome trees of two or three feet in diameter and thirt^'-five to fifty feet tall, will give annually twenty to forty pounds of good rub- ber. In collecting rubber, if the trees have been prop- erly matured, from eight to twelve pounds can be taken biennial!}-; but after the tree is twelve years of age, a sufficient quantity of sap or emulsion could be annual- ly extracted from each tree to yield from ten to fifteen pounds of good, elastic rubber." The United States Consul in Costa Rica sa3-s: " The trees are easily planted, need no cultivation and grow rapidly from the seed. Hitherto most people have been discouraged from planting rubber trees, owing principally to the length of time needed for the tree to become sufficiently large to produce a profitable yield of gum; but the few who have undertaken the investment can now look forward to a time not far dis- tant when their few thousand rubber trees may bring them a fortv:ne little dreamed of." 26 CASTILLOA BEST OK RUBBER TREES Another consul says of rubber planting in Nicar- agua; " The trees grow very rapidly, and plantations might easily be made which, in the course of ten or twelve 3'ears, would become highly remunerative. It is an incontrovertible fact, as far at least as Nicaragua is concerned, that the rubber tree is susceptible of cul- tivation. This assertion is based upon the success that has accompanied the few experiments that have already been made. In this district are large tracts of land suitable for growing rubber trees. It is the opinion of those here wiio are interested in rubber production, that it would be very profitable." John Hinckler Hart, F.L.S. , Superintendent of the Botanical Department of Trinidad, who is an authori- ty, says: " The experience personally gathered during twenty-three years of service in the West Indies; what has been gathered from writers on the subject who have detailed their observations from the viewpoint of both travelers and cultivators; and from actual travels and observations personally made in Nicaragua and other parts of Central America, lead to the conclusion that for the pre.sent the most valuable rubber for planting in Trinidad is the Gastilloa elastica. This is the kind from which a crop can be most quickly obtained, and it is the fastest grower. Castilloa trees are not found growing in swamps or inundated lands, but on the flat, moist banks of rivers. Of all the different species of rubber-producing trees, the Castilloa should prove, un- der cultivation, the most remunerative. I am of the opinion that, properly and economically conducted, the growing of rubber offers a safe and suitable invest- ment." GROWTH AND YIELD OP CASTILLOA 2/ Superintendent Hart has continuously and persist- ently advocated the cultivation in Trinidad of the Cas- tilloa, and at the time of writing, in 1898, had orders for 300,000 seeds. He declared that the climate of Trinidad is probably better suited than is that of any other West India island for the successful growth of Castilloa, and that it was his belief that it is equal to the climate of Central America. In Ceylon Castilloa trees six years old had a cir- cumference of twent3'-six inches three feet from the ground, and grew three and a half inches in girth dur- ing the j^ear. Two years later the same trees were fort}^-three feet in height and thirty-two and a half inches around at three feet from the ground. Robert Cross, the well-known collector, in his re- port on gathered seeds of the various rubbers furnished to the Indian government, saj's: " My own opinion is that, planted in suitable places and properly wrought, Castilloa will be found to give a larger return per acre than any other plant or tree cultivated in India." Mr. Cross further reported to the Madras govern- ment " that a tree of Castilloa. one and one-half to two feet in diameter should give twelve pounds of rubber per annum. ' ' Many other sound authorities have giv^en their testimony as to the high value of Castilloa elas- tica, which produces nearly every pound of rubber from Costa Rica and of all the tropical countries north of that republic. Senor Romero, lately ambassador from Mexico, in his very full and elaborate work, " Coffee and Rubber Culture in Mexico," says of the Castilloa: " The large profits of rubber culture are obvious. A plantation 28 RUBBER BETTER THAN GOLD will give, at the end of a few 3'ear.s, six pounds of sap a 3'ear for every tree; that sap would lose about one- half b}' evaporation. Then each tree would 3'ield three pounds net of rubber; the minimum rate of produc- tion, which will increase every succeeding year to the extent of being three or four times greater than the first." In recent years, the better informed, more intelli- gent and enterprising dwellers in tropic countries have observed with concern the destruction of wild rubber trees, aiul have asked, with deep interest, whether or not the cultivation of rubber-producing trees will pay. Their interest in this question has been shared by manufacturers, dealers and others. This has caused careful study of the subject by capable inquirers. Per- haps such studies led to the expression credited to the late Collis P. Huntington, who made millions by building and managing railroads. He is said to have remarked: " If I had my life to live over again I would not wear it awa}' in the hard struggle that falls to the lot of the railroad promoter. I would go into the tropics of Mexico and grow rubber. It is better than gold, and it will make more millionaires than oil has made." Yet he was eminently successful in his field, which recjuired of him wide and accurate knowledge, keen in- sight and prudent judgment; therefore the words above quoted are deserving of consideration. Others have given evidence of like tenor; as Senor don Matias Roiiiero, formerly minister at Washington for Mexico, who is perhaps the most quoted of all writers on Mex- ican agriculture. He says: "A well-managed ruliber QUESTIONS TO BE ASKED 29 plantation, after six years, should be able to distribute among its shareholders from one hundred to one thou- sand per cent, annually on their investment." Before accepting as a guide opinions which encour- age hope of such relativel}- great profits, prudent peo- ple will stud}' well the evidence of man}' witnesses, that they may know what are the grounds on which such opinions are based; for rul)l)er cultivation is a new industry, almost wholly unknown to millions of intelligent and well-read people of America. Before questions of detail as to management of plantations should come the questions: What are the cost of culti- vation, the yield of gum and the probable value of the product ? What is the existing, and what will be the future, demand for that product ? Other questions of importance, relating to condi- tions other than those of soil and climate, will natural- ly occur to the prudent investor; but, so far as may be learned from the rapidly-growing mass of evidence, there is little if any risk in growing rubber in cleared plantations, and none whatever if planted among forest trees, — a plan which closely follows nature. All trustworthy evidence obtainable seems to war- rant the opinion that a safe guide, for those who think of engaging in tropical agriculture, may be found in the figures gathered into the next page. They present the means of the statistics and the estimates offered by thirt\--five authorities, to show the probable quantities of gum from a yearly yield of Castilloa elastica trees of various ages and conditions. The values are those of like quantities of gum at the mean New York price for the decade ending with the year 1900 : 30 EVIDENCE OF MANV WITNESSES Countries AUTHORITIES Bolivia Brazil Brazil Calcutta Calcutta Ceylon Colombia . . . Colombia . . . Costa Rica. . Guatemala . Guatemala . Guatemala . Jamaica . . . . Jamaica . . . . Jamaica . . . , Mexico .... Mexico .... Mexico . Mexico .... Mexico .... Mexico .... Mexico .... Mexico .... Mexico .... Mexico .... Mexico . . . . Mexico .... Mexico . . . . Mexico . . . . Mexico . . . . Nicaragua . Nicaragua. Nicaragua . Trinidad . . General . . . Conway, Sir Martin Kennedy, K. K., U. S. Consul Temple, Briti.sh Vice-Consul Handbook of Commercial Products Merritt, S., V. S. Consul Botanic Gardens Report Croft, C. I.. Consul Sims, W. E., U. S. Consul Koschny, Theodore F Chama Co Horta, Jose Record, Philadelphia Derry, R., British Colonial Forestry Board. Kew BviUetin Jackson, J. R., Kew (Kicl.'^ia af/icana) Artiz, Dona Felipa Aztec Co Bedford, W. J., manager El .Salto British Foreign Office Bryden, superintendent Coate, A. B Bering, Sir Henry, British ^linister Ellsworth M. R Fernandez, Don Rejolia Gano, Charles C, C. E Guenther, Richard, Consul-General Mayangos, Don Eateo Romero, Senor don Matias St. Croix, M Yorba, Senor Armstrong, W. S Crawford, John Morris, Dr. Daniel Hart, vSuperintendent Botanical Garden... Bureau American Republics Ounces Values 80 248 44 26 12S 80 320 48 16 So 43 z6 176 48 21 5b 48 64 112 170 267 56 93 So 32 32 169 24 h4 64 $3.00 930 1.65 ■975 4.80 3.00 12.00 1-95 .bo I. So .bo 3.00 1.64 ■975 6.60' I .So .7S8 2.10 I. So 2.40 .40 4.20 b-35 10.01 2.10 3-488 3-99 1.20 1.20 ^■34 .90 2-475 2.40 From the above thirty-five reports it appears that the average of the mean yield reported was 81.6 ounces of crude rubber gum, or 5 pounds 1.6 ounces. The value was calculated at 60 cents a pound net, and aver- aged $3.06 per tree. In a series of tests made, evidently' with much in- telligent care, by A. B. Coate, manager of a planta- tion on the Isthmus of Tehauntepec, Mexico, it was CAREFUL TESTS OE RUBBER TREES 31 found that the milk oozed so slowly from the bark of young trees, and in such small quantity, that it would not leave the cuts. In some cases the milk was allowed to dry into strip in the channels; in other instances it was brushed from the cuts and solidified by modes other than slowh' drying in the air. The first lot of eight trees thus tested by Mr. Coate and mentioned in the following table, stood 5 x 8 feet apart; the second lot of eight were 8 x 10 feet apart. The design is to bleed out enough of these to relieve their fellows, when they shall have become crowded. It appears from the reports that 29 tappings of trees from 5.7 to 7.75 inches in diameter and 30 to 78 months old, averaging 44 months, gave an average of 2.5 ounces per tree, which may be valued at 9.4 cents net. CONDITIONS No. Trees Diam. Inches Onnces of Gnm Cultivated; 42 months old; all strip Retapping above; interval one month Cultivated; 30 months old from seed Retapping last above; interval one month. Half -wild male Wild; estimated age 78 months; slight flow 8 8 8 3 I I 5 -70 5-70 b.25 6.25 8. 00 2.70 19.00 2.70 8.00 3.00 29 Tw^elve tappings of uncultivated and larger trees showed results as follows : CONDITIONS No. Trees Diam. Inches Ounces of Gum Injured by fire two years before tapping. . . Of this gum S oz. was strip Of this gum 7.3 oz. was strip ; bark 's in No strip; liark "« in. thick Retapping last above; interval 3 months.. . I month.. . . First tapping; no strip Bark «.,' in. thick; no strip 14 12 II iS iS 18 14 20 U) 12 1(1.2 24.0 22.0 46.0 15.0 14.0 23.0 55 -o 40.0 4.0 Male 13 I 1 -T f. 32 BEST RESUI^TS COMF, FROM SIMPm MEANS At 60 cents a pound the average yield above shown would be worth 81 cents. Five of the trees were not far from the same size, but their yield ranged from 15 to 55 ounces. Reliable data as to some of these points are not easil}- obtained, because few years have passed since careful study of the subject began, and because few have had conclusive experience in this industry. It is not denied that much knowledge has been gained of the habits of growth, the needs and the 3'ield of vari- ous rubber-giving trees, nor can it be doubted that correct deductions from such knowledge will gi\-e in time a trustworthy guide to the planter. There may be little risk in planting rubber in the way which re- quires the least outlay of time, labor and mone}-; and there are practical planters who hold that this way gives the best results yet obtained from ruljber cul- ture. B-aring on the question of yield of rubber trees we have the testimou}' of a number of witnesses. Many of these were United States consuls who were instruct- ed by the Department of State to inquire into the sub- ject. It is fair to assume that each, as it is certain that some of them, give in their replies evidence obtained from many who had thorough and practical knowledge of the crude rubber industry. A summary of the evi- dence of these consuls, and of other seemingly trust- worthy witnesses, is given in the foregoing table. It has seemed proper to estimate the value at a conserv^a- tive figure. Charles C. Gano, C. E., spent nearly ten j-ears in Mexico, during which he studied the subject of culti- YIELD OF GUJI FROM CASTILI.OAS 33 vating rubber. He says that a seven-year-old Gastilloa should 3'ield at least 1.5 pounds of pure rubber. This yield should increase 8 ounces each of next 1 7 years of its growth, and after the tree attains the age of 25 years it should give 15 to2o pounds of fine gum annu- ally during the rest of its life. Such 5-ield from an acre of trees 15 feet apart each way, or 222 trees per acre, would amount to 3,330 pounds. If it should be estimated that the gum will sell for a price equal to the mean of the quotations for 316,807,000 pounds imported in the last nine years, viz., 84 cents, and that 14 cents will be required to pay expenses of gathering and marketing, the planter should have an income of $2,331 per acre. Mr. Daniel Morris is a botanist of wide reputation who has studied the rubber- j-ielding species, not only experimentally in botanical gardens, but also in their native forests in Central America. There he became con\'inced that Gastilloa trees, planted in suitiable local- ities, will yield an average of one pound sterling, or about five dollars, each at the end of eight or ten years. Superintendent Hart, of the Botanical Gardens of Trinidad, says there are in that garden Gastilloa trees which will give from four to six pounds weight per annum. An acre of 200 trees will give a gross return of some ninety pounds sterling, saj^ $450 per annum, while the expense for maintenance is much less than for any other known crop. In the State of Amazonas, Mr. Temple, British Vice-Consul, found, by examining the books of a num- ber of actuall}- worked rubber estates, that the average vield of Para gum per tree, per season, may safely be 34 COST OF PRODUCTION OF RUBBER estimated at 2.2 to 3.3 pounds, under favorable condi- tions, although on some estates the average is not more than I.I pounds. Sir Martin Conway says that in Bolivia he found nobody counting on less than three pounds of rubber per tree annually, and no estimates higher than seven pounds. In the Ceylon Botanic Gardens one Para rubber tree was tapped, with results as follows: At II years age 27.75 ounces At 13 years age 42.00 ounces At 15 years age 45.00 ounces At 17 years age 51.00 ounces At 19 years age 48. 25, ounces Evidence has been given showing that 5,000 cul- tivated Castilloas gave, in 1S99 and 1900, 12,000 pounds of gum. This is equal to two pounds six and one-fifth ounces per tree. Cost of production is of course an important ele- ment in any business, but .seems to be comparatively light in the case of rubber cultivation. Even when land is cleared of forest growths, and rubber trees are planted in the open fields, the expen.se seems to be not heavy. M. H. I^ewis, Vera Cruz, Mexico, says that sixty dollars an acre will clear and plant with two hun- dred such trees. The cost of replanting where trees die, and of cultivating, will be forty dollars per acre the first year, and twenty dollars annually thereafter until the seventh year, making a total of two hundred dol- lars per acre, or one dollar per tree by the time they are read}^ to tap. The same gentleman says that the cost of planting among forest trees, including cost of plants for 150 RUBBER PLANTING IN COSTA RICA 35 trees per acre, is thirty-six dollars per acre. Weeding and replacing plants which die will average twelve dol- lars annually during the next seven years. The trees will then have cost eighty cents each, or one hundred and twenty dollars per acre, and will be ready to tap. Theodore F. Koschny, of San Carlos, Costa Rica,, where GafitiUoos elastica in great numbers thrive, has found by many experiments that the cost of planting 115 to 117 trees per acre, and caring for them until seven years old, would be small in comparison with the large and lasting retvirns which would be secured from the gum, plus the value of the plantation. He would take sixteen ounces of gum per tree in their eighth year. Witnesses who have given evidence as to the yield of rubber trees, are quoted as having written as fol- lows : "A large tree, five feet in diameter, will yield, when first cut, about twenty gallons of milk, each gal- lon of which will make about two and a half pounds of rubber." — Thomas Belt, F. G. S. " Trees planted on lands having the soil, climate and elevation adapted to the culture will produce from five to six pounds of juice on the first year that they are tapped, which amount is equivalent to 2.4 pounds of pure rubber. One hundred thousand rubber trees, the first year's harvest, will 3'ield :^i 20,000. " — British Foreign Office Report. "x\l)out 44 per cent, of rubber remains from the original amount of milk after the water and other mat- ters have been eliminated by evaporation. Trees plant- ed ou lands having the soil, climate and elevation ■36 RETURNS TEMPTING AND GOOD adapted to their culture, will produce from five to six pouuds of juice in the first year that they are tapped which amount is equivalent to two and two-fifths pounds of pure rubber. This product will be gradu- ally mcreased every year for the next four or five years, and will sell for fifty cents per pound on the plantation. By the sixth or seventh year rubber trees will be in bearing, and the seventh and thereafter should yield from three to five pounds per tree Given SIX hundred pounds as the yield of an acre of 193 trees and fifty cents per pound as the profit realized over ■expenses, we have a profit of three hundred dollars .gold per acre."— Bulletin of American Republics. " Trees from one to three and a half feet in diam- eter yield annually from two and a half to twenty gal- lons of emulsion, from each gallon of which about two pounds of rubber should be collected."— J. Crawford botanist. ' " On an average about forty pounds of rubber is obtained from each tree of average size."— C. I. Croft Consul, Cartagena, Colombia. " Planting is easy and inexpensive and the returns very tempting and good. Trees should yield from ^i .50 to $2.00 each per annum. There are two meth- ods of planting— from the seed and from the shoot. The former takes from six months to a year longer than the latter. Statements vary widely as to the period of maturity. Some claim that the tree will yield when four or five years old, and some that it will reqmre a much longer period."— U. S. Consul-General De Ivcon, at Ecuador. " Trees planted in land having the desired climate ACTUAI, RESUI.TS REPORTED 37^ and elevation for the culture will produce from five to six pounds of juice on the first year that they are tapped (at the expiration of the fifth year from plant- mg), which amount is equivalent to 2.4 pounds of rub- ber. This product will be gradually increased each year for the next four or five years. Don Juan Aleman, Aca- yucan, has a grove of several hundred rubber trees of all ages, nine years and down, and irregularly planted, with coffee between, in healthy condition. Last year forty rubber trees were bled, producing 125 pounds of rubber (3^ pounds to the tree), or over $480 per acre. Seven hundred and fifty trees will produce 4,500 pounds, worth at the plantation twenty to twenty-two dollars per hundred pounds. Deducting the cost of curing, he will have a net profit of $1,225, besides the profit from corn, bananas and vanilla raised as side crops. The net profit on the investment of 100,000 rubber trees, after deducting the entire cost of land and all expenses up to the first year of har\-esting, will be $95,000, and each of the succeeding harvests for twen- ty-five or thirty years will bring a steady income of over $100,000. "—Consul-General vSir Henry Neville Daring to the British Government. " There is one case authenticated in vSoconcusco, where three young forest rubber trees were trans- planted which have now j-ieldcd for more than thirty- five years. The diameter of trunks of said trees is about seven feet, and the diameter of branches at their great- est expanse is more than eighty feet. Each of ''these trees yields annually more than fifty pounds of gum. " — Richard Guenther, U. S. Consul. "On the River Aquiry, or Acre, one of the tribu- 38 EIGHT HUNDRED DOI.I,ARS AN ACRE taries of the River Purus, two hundred trees yield as much as three tons of rubber per annum." — Consul Kennedy, Para, Brazil. M. lycCroix, on his plantation on the Tulija River in Chiapas, is said to have .secured an average of five pounds of rubber from trees six years old. Mr. M. H. Lewis, a rubber planter on the Isthmus, says in a letter to the " India Rubber World," July i, 1899, that at an estimate conservative in the extreme, a plantation of rubber trees will ^-ield the first year's tapping eighty dollars per acre, four hundred dollars per acre four 3'ears later and eight hundred dollars per acre when the trees are in full bearing. ' ' The quantit}' collected at one cutting .seldom ex- ceeds eight to ten pounds." — vSamuel Merritt, Consul- General, Calcutta, India. On vSeptember 2, 1891, Mr. Mateo Mijangos wrote to the " Official Journal " a letter about rubber culti- vation, in which he says, among other things : "A rub- ber tree gives, in its first year of bearing, two pounds of product; three pounds in the second year, four in the third, and five in the fourth; together fourteen pounds, which, sold at fift}' cents, gives seven dollars, or $1.75 per tree each 3'ear . "A rubber plantation in full bearing, sa}' the eighth year, should yield anywhere from $250 to $350 gold profit per acre. Matured rubber plantations are not for sale." — Philadelphia Museum. W. P. Wilson. Di- rector. ' ' The greatest number of agriculturists seem to agree that a tree, after attaining its proper proportions, should i^roduce a quantity of rubber weighing not less THREE HUNDRED PER CENT PROFIT 39 than six pounds annually. It must be obsen^ed, how- ever, that as the ^ield of each tree will increase annu- ally, there is ever}' reason to believe that a tree twenty years old will give fifteen to twentri-five pounds of sop eochyeor.'" — Sr. Don Matias Romero. " Trees growing in the forest to a height of about forty feet and a diameter of three feet, yield from twen- t3'-five to one hundred pounds of raw rubber per anntun, according to the size of the tree." — W.E.vSims, Consul, Colon, Colombia. Senor Sabatana has a rubber plantation of ninety acres located in Guatemala, across the line from the Department of Palenque, in the State of Chiapas, the trees now being thirty years old. This gentleman claims that his plantation paj's him over $1,300 per acre each ^-ear. In " ^Mexico and United States," published in 1898, Romero sa^-s : ' ' Enough has been written lateh' on rubber culti- vation to show that the profits in Mexico, at least, would be very great; indeed, three hundred per cent, on the capital invested is a possible return, after five years, from cultivating CastiUoa elastica in that Repub- lic. This is a return which provides plenty of margin for contingencies. Rubber growing is no longer in the experimental stage, as witness the plantation of La Esmeralda, in Oaxaca. According to the same report the total expense for five years' cultivation of a rubber plantation of 100,000 trees will not exceed $25,000 in silver, and the ^deld of 100,000 trees at the first year's harvest will bring the planter $120,000, besides the product obtained from the corn, vanilla beans, cacao 40 SAFEST AND MOST LUCRATIVE INDUSTRY and bananas raised from side planting. The net profit on the investment, after deducting the entire cost of the land and all expenses up to the first year of har- vesting, will be $95,000." Our consul at Para said: "There is no question whatever as to either the practicability or the immense lucrativeness of rubber growing in this valley. Here it is solely a matter of time. The seeds are abundant and easily obtained. They germinate easil}' and grow rapidly. The ^'oung rubber trees can be found in the forests and transplanted; but it is much less labor to plant the seeds in a garden bed until they are ready to transplant. The great advantage of a compactly plant- ed rubber grove would be the saving of labor in trav- eling through the swamp. The rest of the work is light and quickly done, except, perhaps, the coagulation of the milk. Then why don't they plant rubber trees? That is the question Brazilians are beginning to ask each other. Every one confesses that it would be a most magnificent investment of capital. The few ex- periments that have been made abundantly prove that they are right." Senor don Matias Romero, author of the most com- plete work in existence on Mexican agriculture, says : "Anyone in a situation to enable him to make a rubber plantation of greater or less extent, may undertake it at once, with the full conviction that it is the safest and most lucrative industry; neither cacao, tea, coffee, sugar nor any other tropical product would give the same profits as rubber; and the returns from each of these industries are in reality equal to those obtained from a rich gold mine." THE DAY OF SCOFFING IS PAST 4I Eugene Ackerman is said to have carefully studied the rubber interests while at Para, and is credited with the statement that the difficulty of getting laborers in the valle}' of the Amazon will prevent production keep- ing up with the increase in consumption. The India Rubber World, published in New York, is an authority on subjects relating to the rubber busi- ness. It says: ' ' The day of scoffing at the idea of culti- vating rubber is past. That there will be disappoint- ments and faihires in fraudulent and badly managed plantation schemes no one doubts; but that the culti- vated rubber tree ten years hence will be a productive and exceedingly profitable part of many large planta- tions is an undisputed fact." It said in February, 1901: "As to the future of rubber prices, certain considerations are worthy of at- tention. In the first place, the great increase in the demand for raw material in recent years has been due both to new uses of rul)ber and to the introduction of the use of rubber goods into new fields. In not a few cases the recent rate of growth is doubtless meeting a check for the present, whereas the production of rub- ber seems likely to continue, in which event it would seem that prices should decline. On the other hand, a very marked decline in prices would lead to still fur- ther new uses of rubber, which would prevent the cost from sinking to former levels, or at least from staying there very long." That periodical quotes prices of rubber in New York and Liverpool for the years 1892 to 1900, both included, from which the mean prices and rises and declines were found to be as follows, in cents : 42 RISE IN PRICE AI^MOST CONSTANT Years New York Difference I^iverpool Difference 1892 65.85 67.S5 1893.. 67.00 — 1. 15 73.90 + 6.05 1894 68.75 + 1-75 71-85 — 2.05 1895 75-75 + 7-00 77.20 + 5.35 1896 78. 00 + 2.25 81.80 + 4.60 1897 84.25 + 6.25 87.05 + 5.25 1898 95.00 + 10.75 97.70 + 10.65 1899 100.50 + 5.50 102.05 + 4.35 1900 97-25 ~ 3-25 "'2.25 + -20 It i.s evident that the rise in prices has been almost constant since the year 1S93, and amounted to 30.25 cents per pound, or 45.1 percent. During those years the importation of crude rubber into the United States was 316,807,680 pounds, of the vahie of ^268,946,081, or 84 cents per pound. In 1893 and 1900 there was a decHne in New York, and in 1S94 in Liverpooh In the 3'ear ending Tune, 1899, the forests of the tropics sent out some 100,000,000 pounds of rubber. It has been shown that of that vast quantity Para alone furnished about 36,500,000 pounds, Manaos 12,175,000 pounds. Africa ranks next as a producer, but its gum is inferior to that of Brazil; then come in the order of their importance as producers of gum, Ecuador, Nic- aragua, Colombia, Mexico, and lastly, A^enezuela. Mil- lions of dollars invested in steamships and railroads are employed in carrying to the markets of the civil- ized world the product of these tropic trees, and in taking back tho.se of factory and of farm to pay for the labor of Indians in the wilderness, and of a host of white men who also serve this great branch of indus- try, which has the safet}', the convenience and the NOT COMPETITIVE BUSINESS 43 comfort of humanity for its purpose. The construc- tion of the Congo railway was large!}-, if not wholly, due to the demands of this great industry. Money flows from trade centers of Europe and the United States to the rubber traders. Under the .stim- ulus of this traffic cities have been built; perhaps the greatest of these being Para, at the mouth of the Am- azon. It has a population of 100,000, and is the rub- ber market of the world. But 2,000 miles up the Amazon is a lusty 3'oung rival, Manaos, with 40,000 inhabitants, to which go vessels direct from ports in distant parts of the world. Para ships daih' carry some 100,000 pounds of rubber, and Manaos sends out about one-third as much. There are upon the western coast of Africa two cities of size which almost wholly live upon the rubber trade. Rubber growing is not a competiti\-e business in the sense in which the term is used customarily; its experimental stage may not be past, and the actual, practical iield of operations is in effect quite new. The task is to supph" a hundred million pounds of rubber demanded each year. To do this, the product of fifty million trees giving two pounds of gum each would be needed. Manifestly the field is not cramped nor crowd- ed. One who has income enough to supjiort him while waiting for the rubber trees to reach a paying age ma}- invest in planting rubber, assured against early and sharp competition: for comparatively few will have the courage to plant and the patience to wait eight years for an income which, when it does come, should pay amply for all expenditures and waiting. Only a few years have passed since the first rub- 44 AI.!, SOURCES OF SUPPLY INSUFFICIENT ber tire was made. To-da}- a million — -or is it perhaps several millions — of tires are rolling o\'er highway's and byways in all lands where man may go with more or less safety. Automobiles not only quickly wear out great quantities of rubber, on streets and on roads already well paved and smooth, but they will be the most powerful factor ever known in leading to the making of more good roads, until improved highways will be the rule instead of the rare exception in all the land. And such improvements will bring into service yet more rubber-tired vehicles, which will in their turn work for yet more extensive improvements in roads, and so en, at an accelerating rate. Rubber may be worked over into new forms, and thus be made to .serve a second and perhaps a third time, after having been useful in shapes and for pur- poses for which great elasticity is required; but that which is worn from a tire is whol!}' lost. Destruction of the sources of supply on the one hand and more rapid and complete, destructiou of the manufactured product on the other must result in such scarcity that an advance in prices will follow, unless some effective means shall be adopted for changing such conditions. Planting rubber trees may change all this, but years will proba- bly pass before enough gum will be obtained from plantations to materially reduce the price of rubber. Already the demand for rubber is so great that prices have advanced largely. Changes plainly foreseen are likely to make a demand which all known sources of supply cannot meet. Even if planting of rubber should go on for a generation at a rate many times as great as is now known, there would be no more rubber than MODERN NKEDS WILL SUSTAIN PRICES 45 will be required at prices which will give large profits. Some of the rise in value is doubtless due to the general prosperit}- which advanced the value of other raw materials; but it seems safe to conclude that the requirements of modern life will scarcel}- permit prices to fall much, even should a financial and industrial panic come. Economies practicable on a cultivated plantation are enough to give profit, because the trees are on a limited area and therefore within easy reach; there are no losses through advances to laborers who may run away with the rubber; no " dead losses" due to illness or death among laborers; there is saving of time and money and improvement in the quality of the gum through the use of scientific methods in treating the milk; and the owner of the plantation himself may market his crop, without pa3'ing profits to many mid- dle-men, as producers of wild rubber now have to pay. Those who cultivate rubber have advantages which those who till the land of the North do not enjoy. Chief among these is that uniformity of seasons which insures regularity of harv^ests throughout the decades, thus preventing over-supply and depression of prices. No drought or flood cuts off the crops, nor does frost in a night destroy the products of years of working and of hoping. Planters who have suitable lands raise bananas, colocasia and cassa\-a with which to feed their laborers, and to sell for the nione}' to pay expenses while wait- ing for the first crop from their rubber trees. The waiting may seem long and tedious, but each day brings something to help carry the permanent invest- ment toward the han-est; and the planter has the as- 46 RUBBER COMPARED WITH NORTHERN CROPS surauce that each day adds to the vakie of his rubber trees, and to the probabiHty that he will in a few years enter on the enjoyment of a sure income for life. No insurance, no pension, no annuity so great as his rub- ber grove will probably give could be bought for ten times its cost. Analy.sis of carefully gathered and trustworthy data shows that the principal eight crops harvested in the United States during the thirty-seven years that ended with 1902, had a general average farm value equal to only $18.98 per acre. Their yield, their values and the amounts by which the ascertained a alue of banana, and the calculated val tie of rubber crops (.r(r6'(? the value of those eight American crops, is shown by the subjoined table: Yield Per Acre Value Difiereuce in favor of Per Acre Rubber Bananas Barley, Inishels. . . 22.9 15-3 24. « 27.4 82.5 13.6 12.5 1 -25 797 • 3 1^13 49 f.-'Cy-^ X7 |io6 44 I 10 46 1 09 86 111 13 76 04 112 12 109 47 .109 07 64 12 Buckwheat, " Corn, " Oats, " . Potatoes, " Rye, " . Wheat, " . Hay, tons 9 -;7 lu 07 8 80 48 89 7 81 10 65 10 86 55 81 3'-'3 39 302 79 304 06 268 97 3-^5 05 302 21 302 00 257 05 Tobacco, pounds. - General averages 118 98 i^293 88 $^00 97 These figures show that the farmer of the United States, in return for all the intelligence and the dili- gence and energy he puts into his work, for the use of his money and for his exhausting toil, receives from his farm far less than the safest and simplest of all crops DIVIDEND PAYING VALUE OF RUBBER TREES 47 of tropical America gives for little more than the mere harvesting. If a tract were planted with rubber trees twenty- feet apart, and if their annual yield of gum should be worth $3.06 per tree, the net profit would be ^312.86 more annually than the farm value of those eight crops of the North. In other words, a rubber plantation should give each year a profit equal to the average farm value of those crops for thirty-seven years and nine and a half months. In the year 1902 a consul of the United States was widely quoted as having written alarming statements about the rubber-planting industry. Articles which were wddeh' published in the United States and Europe, insinuated, if they did not distinctly avow, that " rub- ber-planting is worse than a lottery," and that those who induced people to join in planting rubber were ' ' digging a hole into which good American dollars may be dropped out of sight forever. ' ' Yet the very articles which contained such charges said that on a plantation near Tuxtepec, in the State of Oaxaca, Mexico, 350 rubber trees seven to nine years old gave 800 pounds of gum, for which $312 U. S. gold was re- ceived. If correctly reported, the average yield per tree was 2.29 pounds, and the average income per tree was 89 cents. If those trees stood twent}^ feet apart, the income was ^96.27 per acre. If the cost of clearing, planting and caring for that plantation through the seven to nine 3'ears — say eight years — averaged $300 per acre, that first crop paid 3.8 per cent, per annum on that cost. If those figures are correct, those who own that plantation have in it a 48 RUBBER GROWING SHOULD BE CO-OPERATIVE property which now pa^'s an amount equal to five per cent, per annum on $1,925.40 per acre. One might be safe in saying land and cultivation which, in a merely experimental stage, pays five per cent, a year on nearly two thousand dollars per acre, ma}- be a safe invest- ment at $300 per acre. Nevertheless, he who would hurry into the planting of rubber would do well to remember that, rich as the promises of the industry now^ are, much remains to be learned about the effects which the varyir.g conditions of climate, of soil, of exposure and other matters have on the various kinds of rubber-bearing plants. With- out knowledge of such suljjects one may find loss where fair gains are promised, even though trustwor- thy authorities agree that the cultivation of rubber will long be most profitable. The facts reported seem to show clearh- and strong- ly that rubber growing especially invites co-operation by the many who can invest small sums, and who can scarcel}^ afford, even if they were willing, separately to give their own time and labor to a crop which re- quires so little attention, during the six or eight years that may elapse, between the planting and the first harv^est. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 111 000 927 912 A •