The Bessemer indicator., 1894-04-14
FROM THE RUBBER TREE
HOW THE MILK 10 GATHERED
ny HULEROS.

NY HOLEROS.
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The BARK 10 Dashed In Many Places and
the Liquid Rubber Gushss out-This
Method Destroys the Tree In Two Sea-
sons-Hardsssd Rubber.
proposed to accompany the rub
ber gatherer on his rounds, and in
few minutes we were out Of sight
and sound OF camp, In wild that
was literally trackless. writes Ed
ward W. Perry In Outing, in an arti-
Gle on how elastic gum is gathered
in Mosguitea Soon we came to
rubber tree, Its smooth gray trunk
rising slender and branchless forty
feet. The youth threw his burse. 70
the ground. and looked about until
he found thicket of cariso, with
perhaps forty feet long.
The walls OF this BAN boo are
scarcely more than an eighth OF az
Inch in thickness. and the joints.
fully grown, are some two feet long.
They grow In thick clusters, fire.
quently 80 dense that no animal can
pass between the stalks. Archiug
over they often droop until the tops
sweep the ground, and the beauti-
fully delicate foliage is so abundant
as to form an apparently solid bank
OF green.
With blow OF his machete the
hulero cut down one of these and
Clipped off three or four of the
joints, each forming long tube
closed at each end. With these we
returned to the rubber tree.
He then made small loop Of one
end OF the rope we brought with us,
and of the other end a large loop
passing round both the tree and his
own body. He put both feet through
the smaller loop, SO that his bare
soles grasped the smooth gray bark,
the rope about his ankles serving as
fulcrums to give his feet tight hold.
Then he threw the upper loop well
up the tree trunk, leaned back, and
brought his feet up till they grasped
the trunk eighteen inches or SO from
the ground.
With quick motion, he brought
his body near the trunk, and at the
same time threw up the loop again.
At the instant OF it's highest rise his
shoulders settled back, and caught it
in place. Then his feet were hitched
upward again a foot or more Here
he leaned back in the upper loop,
bracing with his bare feet against
the smooth tree, and with the
machete cut through tho bark two
gashes which converged about six
teen inches below the level at which
they started,
Cut after cut was made in this way
until he reached the branches. Then
as the hulero descended he wetted
his fingers in the milk. and drew q
straight line down from the lower
part OF one pair of Vshaped cuts to
another to guide the flowing milk by
the shortest way. In the lower pair
of cuts he placed piece OF leaf to
act as spout to carry the milk
from the tree to the open end of the
joint of cariso standing beneath.
The first joint was soon full, and
another took its place. A plug of
leaves stopped the full one, and we
went on in search of another tree.
which he soon found. and repeated
the operation of bleeding. When a
number of trees had been tapped in
the same way the operator carried
all the carlso JOINTS filled with the
milk to a convenient spot, where hr
dug small pit in tho ground.
After looking about bit he found
vino of kind wanted, and cut
from it several tender branches.
These he crushed between two stones.
then washed the bruised pulp in a
painful of water, making Il grcenish
infusion with which he sprinkled
thoroughly the walls and bottom of
the pit.
Into this the rubber milk WIS
poured. In an instant that which
touched the earth wet by the infusion,
ooagulpted. Then the contents Of
the pan were poured into the milk
and mixed thoroughly with it, al
most instantly changing it to II
white. spongy mass. This was lifted
out and carried to the nearest brook,
where it was washed and kneaded to
express the juice OF the vine, which,
the hulero explained would suon
harden the rubber 50 much that it
would be little better than tuuo
gum. with which wicked huleros are
wont to adulterate their rubber.
This mode OF gathering rubber de-
stroys tho trees in two seasons, for
each cutting kills that side of the
tree on which the ipcisions are
made. The government has enacted
laws for the protection OF the trees
but laws are ignored in these wilds.
In a very few years all the trees
large enough to bleed win be de-
stroyed, and fifteen or twenty years
will pass before the young crop now
growing will be large enough to fur
nish milk at profit
Yet these trees might be blod year
after year without serious injury. by
using an instrument that could not
cut completely through the bark,
and by leaving In the wound the
rubber which dries there, and which
will. if allowed to remain, protect
the tree from decay.
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Did You SEQ itY
OF course we mean the Worlds Fair