All the labourers start off in debt to some aviador. When they reach the seringal which is their particular destination, the manager there instals them in one of the huts, and tells them which estrada or estradas they are to work. Often one man is given two estradas, which are to be worked on alternate days, so that the trees can have a little longer rest between milking-times. The first job everyone has to do is to lend a hand in clearing the estradas--and very hard work this is. Although the paths are old cuttings, they are blocked with a tangle of undergrowth. They have not been used since last December, when the Amazon, as usual, began its big annual rise, and overflowed its banks with a far-reaching volume of water. Since then the forests have been impassable, therefore work has been impossible until this month of May, when the lands are once more uncovered; meanwhile, tropical vegetation has sprung up and run riot along the paths. When the estradas have been re-cleared--also some new ones may be cut, if sufficient labourers have come up to make further development possible--tapping begins. You have seen how the seringueiro gets the rubber and prepares it for market. When he delivers his week’s collection to the manager, the weight thereof is put to his credit, and his pelles are forwarded to the aviador who has sent him up to the seringal. The aviador sells them, and remits to the seringueiro the amount they fetch, less commission and something on account of his debt. All the rubber-gatherers take part of their dues in stores, as the aviador is general provider to the seringal. You want to know what the seringueiros do when the flood season sets in? Some of them go away to look for work in more civilized parts of the country. But many of them are several weeks’ journey away from any town, or from any part of the country where farming is possible. It would not be worth their while to go so far away and spend a lot of money on looking for work of a different kind, when the chances are so much on the side of their being compelled to return to rubber-gathering as the only means of earning a living. So they stop up in the flooded forests, living in the shanties which are perched on the highest stilts. They get through the long time from December to May as best they can, doing a great deal of smoking, sleeping, and idle gossiping. Sometimes they drink too much, and sometimes they fight--you expected as much? Well, although you have only had a peep at the kind of life these men lead, I am sure you have seen enough to make you slow to judge them harshly. CHAPTER VII DIFFERENT KINDS OF WILD RUBBER Many varieties of the same species of tree belong to the family which is known as “the Heveas,” and several of them are rubber-givers. All rubber obtained from trees of this family has the distinctive name of “Para” in the commercial world. Three qualities of wild Para are sent to market--fine, entrefine or medium, and coarse or negro-head.