Now, to come back to that story I told you “out of my head.” As regards the time in which the events occurred I have already proved to you that rubber was discovered before Columbus discovered America; and as there is no authority which permits me to be more definite on this point, I think you will agree with me that I was bound to give the period of my narrative as Once Upon a Time. The scene of that story is, I now frankly admit, laid in Brazil--to be more exact, in the Valley of the River Amazon. Here, you will surely ask what explanation I have to offer for selecting Brazil as the home of the great discovery--why not Haiti, since the first mention of rubber in history is connected with this island? Or why not Mexico, since the natives of this country are also credited by history with being amongst the earliest folk to make themselves acquainted with the uses of rubber? I am quite ready to reply to such very natural questions. Just as no one can deny that the discovery of rubber has brought about a great revolution in the industrial world, so no one who knows the whole history of that revolution can dispute the fact that it was the discovery of Brazilian rubber which has been far and away the most powerful agent in effecting it. And although history does not give me a cut-and-dried date to support my belief that the aborigines of Brazil collected rubber sap, and made use thereof as early as, or even earlier than, did the natives of Haïti and Mexico, it supplies me with facts which uphold this theory. The Portuguese founded the colony of Brazil early in the sixteenth century, but naturally their first settlements were on the coast. About a hundred years later they began to explore the Amazon. The first European pioneer to journey along this wonderful waterway was a Portuguese missionary, and it is said that he was the first civilized man to see the natives of Brazil making use of rubber. Be this as it may, it is certain that the natives had long been acquainted with the product when the Portuguese began to colonize the Amazon Valley, for the settlers found that the aborigines of the district were skilled in making not only balls for playthings, but such useful articles as water-tight shoes and bags out of the sap of a tree that flourished in this locality. It is not at all likely that the natives of Brazil had received any help from the natives of Haïti or Mexico in the matter of discovering that tree and the peculiar value of its sap. For the aborigines of Southern America are not given to wandering off to foreign lands either on business or pleasure, and even in these days it is only the very enthusiastic traveller or the man whose living depends on the rubber industry who undertakes a journey into the interior of Brazil, where, for the most part, the means of communication are still very primitive.