Nearly all South American States depend upon export and import taxes for their main revenues, and it is a fairly general rule that native products leaving the country pay heavily for that privilege. In Brazil all import dues are imposed and collected by the Federal Government, and are similar throughout the country without respect to the special conditions of separate states; the export taxes are imposed by the State Governments, without restraint. In some regions the “pauta” or export tax is changed every week or so in conformity with prices in world markets, a board sitting specially for the purpose of making these constant adjustments. Some Brazilian products are taxed to what may be called a reasonable extent, but in others exports have been bled out of existence, while still others are barely able to enter world markets, staggering under their load. How many exporting countries would put upon a product facing competition abroad a tax equal to one-third of its value? This is the weight with which Amazonian rubber went to market for many years: the combined charges of the State, municipalities, and other smaller items added up to over thirty per cent of the “official value” of the product. In response to appeals, export taxes were reduced after the outbreak of the European War, and during the year 1916 State taxes, together with dues put on by cities, amounted to about twenty per cent of the value of the rubber—a sufficiently heavy burden, but which Amazonas proposes to increase again; at the same time the product of Matto Grosso pays only twelve per cent, an equal amount is imposed upon rubber originating in the Acre Territory, while that exported from Bolivia, Peru and Colombia, but finding its exit by the water highways of the Amazon, pays only five per cent. As a result of these lesser dues collected by sister countries, there is a certain amount of smuggling done: rubber originating near the boundaries is passed across, and exported as if coming from one of the three Republics named; that such evasion of taxes is limited is due to the lack of roads or of any communication means besides those of the rivers, all of which are watched by Government agents. At the same time that the Amazon imposes this burden upon her rubber, the Eastern (Plantation) product pays nothing at all when the market price is below 18 pence—say thirty-six cents—a pound, and when it stands above two shillings a tax of two and a half per cent of the value is paid.