This criminal syndicate has endeavoured to unload its million of worthless shares upon the British public at £1 each. In their prospectus they make such extraordinary statements, misstatements, and omissions that they make themselves liable to the law to answer to the charges of swindling, obtaining money under false pretences, and various others. In a prospectus published by this company in the _Sunday Times_ of London, December 6, 1908, I note among others, and denounce as deliberate lies, the following statements:-- 1. That they have any _legal_ rights or _legal_ titles in regard to their gruesome "possessions" in the Putumayo. 2. That their rubber collection centres _are surrounded by cultivated lands_. 3. That these "cultivated lands" have a population of about 40,000 Indians. 4. That these Indians are being taught to improve the crude methods that were formerly used of treating the rubber. 5. That the "rubber-trees are the same as those which produce Para Fine." 6. That the territory in their possession "contains valuable auriferous quartz and gravel and deposits of coal and other minerals." 7. That "the exportation of rubber from the Putumayo is increasing." 8. That "the boundary question, even should it affect politically a portion of the Putumayo territory, will not affect the legal rights of the settlers." The following statement, made by the Minister of Foreign Relations of the Republic of Colombia, which I translate from the _Jornal do Comercio_ of Manaos, Brazil, of June 3, 1908, gives an idea of how Colombia views the proceedings of the "civilising company":-- "The companies that are exploiting the adjacent regions of the Putumayo to-day have no legal existence in Colombia, but, on the contrary, are violating many of our legal dispositions and are even committing crimes for which our laws provide penal punishment. When the time comes, the Government of Colombia will not only refuse them protection, but will punish the agents of those companies that are responsible for criminal acts with all the rigours of the law." They also omit to state the following important and interesting facts:-- 1. That their Pevas estate is practically exhausted. 2. That the Nanay estate, utterly neglected and abandoned, is now, and has been for nearly two years, in the possession of Muniz & Co. 3. That their "large staff" of European employees in the sanguinary Putumayo does not exceed eight or ten men at the most. 4. That the "extensive plains" are all covered with the thick, dense forest of the tropics, and that it is a tedious and expensive task to clear even a few acres of land there. 5. That in the short space of three or four years the Putumayo rubber will be completely exhausted.