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Items of Interest Gathered Here and There
Schoolboy Debates.
Schoolboys who declaimed “The boy stoodon the
burning deck, whensall buttim nd fled” have been
laughed off the platform, and now, like Fourth-of
July spread-eagle orators, are only a memory of
the older generation. But the declaiming school
boy, for all his sheepish slurring of words and vo
ciferous false emphases, got one great benefit —prac-
tice in standing on liis feet before an audience. To
give his successors similar practice, forensic debating
under proper instruction is clearly the thing for
upper grammar classes, high schools and academies.
Debating means not only speaking but thinking,
and is therefore more valuable than ‘ ‘ speaking
pieces.” A recent leaflet of the New England As
sociation of Teachers of English makes a strong plea
for the encouragement on the part of teachers and
parents of organized debate between schoolboys. It
has the excitement of contest, is related to the
teaching of English, and has a bearing on a moral
question that has vexed our schools —the question of
secret fraternities and clubs. These societies usual
ly have nothing important to do. The presence in
every school of one or more debating societies would
satisfy in a healthy way the mysterious desire of
young men and women “to belong to something.” —
Exchange.
Gathering India-Rubber.
India-rubber has a curious history in the arts.
Its common name was given to it because it was
first used for removing pencil marks from paper.
It is produced in most tropical lands. The use of it
has been increased until it has become one of the
most important forest products of the world. It
has become in many parts of the world an article
of cultivation, but the native forests of the Amazon
basin and of the Congo, in Africa, are still the
source of the world’s greatest supply. The quantity
has been greatly increased in later years, for the
production has been stimulated by an advance in
price. Interesting facts in regard to the industry
in the Amazon region are given by one who is a
native of the country and familiar with its pro
ductions.
As the steamer moves along, the traveller on the
Amazon, or on any of its numerous navigable trib
utaries, will notice little wisps of smoke rising
from the banks of the river. This smoke, which
is quite characteristic of the most fertile river
banks, indicates the places where the natives are
treating the sap of the rubber-tree to prepare it
for the market.
The business of collecting and preparing rubber
is carried on extensively in the valley of the Amazon.
There are districts of from forty to fifty square
miles owned and operated by one person. The
rubber-trees are scattered more or less plentifully
among other trees that yield no profit as yet.
When a man has secured a large tract of forest
land for the industry, he puts up a rough shelter
upon it, and engages all the Indians of the neigh
borhood, men and women, to help him in the work.
They start out early in the morning to make the
rounds of the estate, for they must get back to the
riverside before the heat of the day becomes too
great. They tap the trees afresh if they need it,
attach the little tin cups for catching the sap, and
bring home whatever sap may have been collected.
The sap of the rubber-tree is a perfectly white
liquid of the consistency of goat’s milk. It is
necessary that it be converted into a solid. This
is effected by the action of a pungent smoke which
coagulates, or curdles, the milky fluid. For this
use the seeds of two different kinds of palm are
employed. Nothing else will answer the purpose.
The seeds are put in an earthen jar which has a
narrow neck, the bottom of which is perforated
with a number of square holes. In this the palm
nuts are burned; the holes in the bottom of the jar
admit a draft and cause a dense smoke to issue
from the neck. This is the smoke seen from the
deck of the steamer.
The operator takes a paddle similar to that with
The Golden Age for April 9, 1908.
which he paddles his canoe and holds the blade of
it over the jar. Upon it he pours the milky juice,
cup by cup, all the time turning the blade so as to
bring all parts of it into the smoke. The fluid is
instantly fixed, and adheres to the wood or to the
rubber already formed. This process goes on until
a solid lump is formed that will weigh perhaps
sixteen pounds.
When the lump has grown large enough for
handling, a slit is cut in it, and the blade is drawn
out. A mass of rubber is left ready for exporta
tion. It is the smoke used in coagulating the sap
that gives crude rubber the dark appearance which
is familiar.
The natives who collect the rubber have little
use for the articles at home. They have no pencil
ings to erase, wear no rain-coats, have no mills to
be supplied with belting, nor automobiles that
require rubber tires. They do, however, make
playthings for their children by pouring the sap
into clay molds of birds, animals and fishes, and
then crushing the clay and removing it. —Exchange.
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The Truth of Optimism.
There has never been a time in the history of the
human race, even in its darkest periods, that there
was not shining, somewhere, a spark of truth which
needed only to be fanned in order to develop a sun
that would have opened the dark places unto the
day. Whenever ignorance and superstition, barbar
ism and lawlessness, or suspicion and despair seemed
about to take possession of the earth and its in
habitants, there has always been some wise man
standing on the heights who saw the light clearly
and proclaimed it to those below that they might
not lose hope.
At the present time, because of recent revelations
of business scandals and political corruption, of
social cancers hitherto unsuspected in our national
life, there are thousands of people in this country
who are really gravely asking themselves the ques
tions: What are we coming to? Where and what
is to be the end of all this? Can it be that the
nation will survive such virulent evils?
These people are genuinely disquieted. They have
been sleeping in ignorance and upon their awaken
ing, at this moment, are not able to recall that such
things have happened before —did happen, in fact,
before they went to sleep. They have lost their
count of the threads which go into the weaving,
into the woof and warp, of a great national life.
They “have failed to make connections” somehow,
and are all at sea. They fear that we are drifting
upon the rocks and that s.on there will come a
horrible smash which will by! the end of us.
It is to these persons that the words, following
herewith, of Secretary Straus are earnestly com
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mended. Mr. Straus is one of the wise men of the*
time “standing upon the heights.” He has not lost
his reckoning. He is above the fog of despair. He
sees the light and is calling it out to those below
the fog.
“We have wrongs in this country. We have not
reached our ideals, but we are nearer in the approach
to our ideals than any other people has ever been.
There are many well-meaning people who forget
that, whatever faults there may be in our institu
tions and policy, they are the highest development
of an evolution reaching through thousands of years.
There are no greater enemies to this system of our
ideal in its principles than those who make an
effort to substitute sociological vagaries for law and
religion.”
Mr. Straus strikes the right note in that para
graph. It is optimism. We are not rushing on
toward the rocks. Our course is straighter, our
keel is clearer, and our sails are trimmer than they
have ever been. But we have struck a little squall
that for the time is testing our seacraft and worthi
ness. We are still in deep water and shall ride out
the storm without loss of either captain or crew.
But we may be mussed up a bit. A mast may topple,
a sail split, and we may have to jettison some of
our excess cargo. But these are little things; they
can be righted at the next port, and, perhaps, to
our great improvement.
Mr. Straus is right. We are at our highest de
velopment after all. Only it isn’t perfect yet.
Neither have we left our tried and true old standbys
behind. We have not sailed away without our
anchor. As Mr. Straus says, we have not substi
tuted sociological vagaries for law and religion.
And so long as we have one of these for our helm
and the other for our anchor, our safety is assured.
—The Washington Post.
Trees As Crops.
“It is as sure that forest land can be made to
grow successive crops of trees under proper methods
as that plough land can be made to grow successive
crops of wheat,” says the Secretary of Agriculture,
in the part of his annual report wherein he speaks
of the national forests.
This country, which once could boast of forest
resources richer than any other nation in the world,
has been cutting three times as much timber for
a number of years as there is grown, and the con
sideration of timber as a crop to be carefully har
vested has come at a time when many of the virgin
forests are already depleted. Continuing, Secretary
Wilson says in part:
“Just as American farming has had to develop, and
is still developing, methods adapted to the conditions
of each region to make the best use of the agri
cultural lands, so must the forester learn by scienti-.
lie study and practical trial to make the best use
of our timber land. And the best use means, of
course, not merely its best use for the growing of
trees, but its best use with reference to all interests
directly or indirectly affected by it.
“As time passes, it will doubtless appear that
the principles which centuries of experience in
older countries have placed at our command can
be applied with increasing good results as we grow
more familiar with our own special conditions. The
issue is sharply between caring for our forests by
applying a system of known efficiency or suffering
certain loss, not of the forests, but of usable water
and soil as well, through the operation of causes as
certain to act as are the rivers to run to the sea.”
The Forest Service now has administration over
more than 164,000,000 acres of land. This is
slightly more than one-fifth of the country’s total
forested area; the remainder is in the hands of
private owners. Nearly all the timber land of the
unappropriated public domain is now in the na
tional forests. This means that it is being protected
against fire, theft, and wasteful exploitation, that its
power to grow wood and store water is being safe
guarded for all time, and that, nevertheless, its
present supply of useful material is open to im
mediate use whenever it is wanted. The report says:
“The timber in the national forests, which is
the legacy of the growth of centuries, is now in the
truest sense public property, administered for the
benefit of the people—primarily for the benefit of
the people of the West, since they are nearest at
hand, but, on the whole, for the benefit of every
part of the country, since the welfare of every
section is interwoven with that of all others. The
communities and settlers adjacent to the forests
are safe from any fear of monopoly of one of the
chief necessities of civilized man.”
The secretary tells interestingly of how the
government manages its timber lands as a trustee.
It gives timber away through free-use permits in
small quantities to the actual home-maker, who
comes to develop the country, and in large quantities
to communities for public purposes. Its system of
management is vastly different from that of a land
lord. When large quantities of timber are harvested
from the national forests sales are made to the
highest bidder, but under such restrictions as look
to the maintenance of a lasting supply answering
to the needs of the locality, to be had without
favoritism and without extortionate demand based
upon the necessity of the consumer. —Harper’s
Weekly.
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