A new industry in cork has lately sprung up, in which leading Spanish
and native commercial firms in Gibraltar are directly interested to a
considerable extent. Extensive warehouses for the storing of cork wood
and machinery for the manufacture of bottle corks have recently been
established at the Spanish lines, about a mile distant from this
fortress, in Spanish territory, where large quantities of cork have
already been stored. The cork is obtained and collected from the
valuable trees, which are owned by the representatives of some of the
oldest nobility of Spain, who have sold the products of their
extensive woods to private individuals for periods reaching as far on
as ten years, for which concession large cash advances have already
been made. The woods commence at a distance of about twelve miles from
Gibraltar, and are of considerable extent.

The railway now in course of construction passes through these woods,
which may ere long offer quite picturesque scenery for travelers,
especially when the cork trees are bearing acorns, which form the
principal food for the fattening of large herds of swine during
certain seasons of the year, in this way, also, contributing to the
value of this tree, which, like the other kinds of oak trees, is of
long and tardy growth. The tree from which the cork is obtained is
somewhat abundant in the mountainous districts of Andalusia. It grows
to a height of about 30 feet, and resembles the _Quercus ilex_, or
evergreen oak, and attains to a great age. After arriving at a certain
state of maturity it periodically sheds its bark, but this bark is
found to be of better quality when artificially removed from the tree,
which may be effected without injury to the tree itself. After the
tree has attained twenty-five years it may be barked, and the
operation is afterward repeated once in every seven years. The quality
of the cork seems to improve with the increasing age of the tree,