Unfortunately the industry is so young that the question of seed selection yet awaits study. The task presents certain practical difficulties, and would be by no means so easy to control as in the case of seed selection from other plants. It will be obvious that several generations of trees raised from selected seed would have to be under observation before any sound deductions could be made from statistics obtained in the course of the work. Thus the problem of seed-selection as it concerns the establishment of a high-yielding strain would involve many years of observation on the part of a trained man. Unfortunately neither the man nor the facilities for such experimental work exist at the present moment in the Federated Malay States. On the scientific side the industry is incommensurably staffed, and most of the workers' time is occupied with routine work connected with estate practice. [Illustration: NEW CLEARING. In the middle distance, felled trees awaiting burning; in the foreground, a flat and wet area with main drainage outlined. (_By courtesy of the manager of Membakut Estate, British North Borneo._)] [Illustration: TYPICAL YOUNG CLEARING, AGED ABOUT THREE YEARS, PLANTED ON VIRGIN SOIL. ORIGINAL JUNGLE TIMBER SLOWLY ROTTING.] SELECTION.--It is possible, however, that the question of strain improvement will be solved in another manner than that of successive breeding from the seeds of high-yielding trees. Such investigatory work is now occupying the attention of scientific organisations in the East, and credit is due to the stations in Java which have begun experimental work in this direction. In brief, the scheme may be outlined as follows. Trees known to be uniformly good yielders are kept under observation, and the seeds gathered carefully. These seeds are germinated in a special nursery, and the best-grown seedlings are selected for further operations. At a certain stage a bud is taken from a high-yielding parent tree and grafted upon the stem of the seedling. When this has "struck" the original head of the seedling is removed. This ensures that one has in the seedling both the stem and future branch system of the same strain as the parent high-yielding trees. It is possible to go a step farther, and by certain processes induce a new root system to grow above the existing roots, which are then removed. One is then able to guarantee that the roots, stem, and branches will be of the original high-yielding strain. An objection sometimes made against the third operation of inducing a new root system is that the original tap-root is removed and that the subsequent system consists only of laterals. Against this argument may be quoted the observed fact that in actual development any one of the laterals may under such circumstances function eventually as a tap-root. [Illustration: LIGHT JUNGLE.]