far, and it was late in the afternoon when I arrived at headquarters.

The very next morning there was a good opportunity to see the smoking
of rubber-milk. A _seringueiro_ had collected his product and when
I went to the smoking-hut I found him busy turning over and over a
big stick, resting on two horizontal guides, built on both sides of
a funnel from which a dense smoke was issuing. On the middle of the
stick was a huge ball of rubber. Over this he kept pouring the milk
from a tin-basin. Gradually the substance lost its liquidity and
coagulated into a beautiful yellow-brown mass which was rubber in
its first crude shipping state.

The funnel from which the smoke issued was about three feet high and of
a conical shape. At its base was a fire of small wooden chips, which
when burning gave forth an acrid smoke containing a large percentage
of creosote. It is this latter substance which has the coagulating
effect upon the rubber-milk. When the supply of milk was exhausted,
he lifted the ball and stick off the guides and rolled it on a smooth
plank to drive the moisture out of the newly-smoked rubber. Then he
was through for the day. He placed the stick on two forked branches
and put some green leaves over the funnel to smother the fire. On top
of the leaves he put a tin-can and a chunk of clay, then filled the
hole in the ground with ashes. Under this arrangement the fire would
keep smouldering for twenty-four hours, to be used anew for the next
repetition of the smoking process.

In the afternoon we again went out to hunt. This time I took only a
12-gauge shotgun. As we travelled through the forest I was impressed
once more by the fascination of the grandly extravagant vegetation.