that made a universal use for rubber changed all this.
Brazil was surprised to find what great treasure her forests
contained. Large rubber areas were found a thousand miles up the
river and she began in a serious way to develop a large crude
rubber business.

Less than twenty years ago Brazil produced practically all the
rubber used in the world. But to-day she furnishes less than
one-tenth of the world's supply. How Brazil, possessing in her vast
forests millions of rubber trees of the finest quality, has been
forced by unfavorable conditions to permit the Far East to sweep
from her in this short time the crude rubber supremacy of the
world is one of the most unusual chapters in modern industrial
history.

CHAPTER 4

WICKHAM'S IDEA

The story of the success of the East Indies in wresting the crude
rubber supremacy from Brazil, begins with an Englishman named
Wickham, who might be called the father of plantation rubber.

Wickham, who had spent some years in South America, understood the
difficulties of gathering rubber in the jungles. He believed that
if rubber could be cultivated it might prove a good crop on the
coffee plantations in India which a blight had recently rendered
valueless for coffee. What a strange fact it is that this blight
gave Brazil a chance to go into coffee growing, and that while
Brazil was losing the rubber supremacy to the Far East, the Far
East at about the same time was surrendering the leadership in
coffee to Brazil. The latter now holds first place in coffee
growing as firmly as does the Far East in rubber growing.

Wickham saw that there were difficulties that would prevent the
gathering of wild rubber from keeping pace with the growing
demand. Although millions of rubber trees still stood untouched in
the Brazilian forests, only those trees near the river banks could
be tapped because of the impossibility of getting the rubber out
of the dense vegetation. Life in the jungle was dangerous and
lonely, and therefore rubber gatherers were not easy to find. They
were compelled to work far from their families and friends, and in
constant danger from wild beasts, reptiles and death-bearing
fevers. It is no wonder that rubber obtained in this way came to
be known as "wild rubber." Moreover, transporting the crude
product through the jungles was hard and expensive and the rubber
obtained under these conditions was not always so clean or high in
quality as might be wished.

"I