102

AGRICULTURE.

for coffee. "The yield of this species, however, was found to
be too small for profitable cultivation, though it paid to
harvest any trees which might be growing semi-wild in
waste places upon an estate. With the rush into tea that was
then beginning, Ceara rubber was soon neglected, and though
the Colony continues to export a little rubber of this class,
the amount is negligible. Another kind which has heen
planted on a small scale, but which of late shows signs of
extension and bids fair to be profitable, is the Panama,
Central American, or Nicaragua rubber (Castilloa elastica),
which has recently been so largely planted in Mexico by
American enterprise. But the important rubber in Ceylon,
the one which is being
planted as rapidly as
seed becomes available,
 and which has
extended in the last
few years froman area
of about 100 acres to
one of 11,000 acres, is
the Para rubber (Hevea
 brasiliensis), the
rubber tree of the
Amazon valley, and
the one whose product
has always obtained
the highest prices in
the markets. Thistree
has shown itself eminently
 suited to the
warm moist climate
of the wet zone of
Qeylon up to about
1,600 feet above the
sea.
The tree is sometimes
 "cultivated in
special plantations,
sometimes scattered among tea or other products. At the
age of about ten years it is generally from 60 to 80 feet
high, 2 or 3 feet in girth, and ready for tapping. V-shaped
incigions are made in the bark with a special knife, or
with a chisel and mallet,and a little tin cup, with a sharp
edge to fasten it easily to the bark, is fixed under each
cut. A little water is placed in each cup to prevent the
milk from clotting. The contents of the cups are
collected and brought into the factory, and the milk ig

RUBBER TAPPING.