THE ROBBER HORRORS.

Evening Star, Issue 14964, 26 August 1912, Page 6

THE ROBBER HORRORS.

ENGLISH DIRECTORS PROTEST. CANON HENSON REPEATS HIS,* CHARGES. PrM* Association—By Telegraph—Copyright. j LONDON, August 24. The solicitors for three English directors of the Peruvian Amazon Company have written to Canon Henson complaining of his sermon in Westminster Abbey on August 4 denouncing the state of affairs lin Putumayo. They assert that his ser- | niou contained baseless charges, particularly the .suggestion that the English directors deserved to be arrested and tried. The solicitors deny that the directors connived .-it Die outiages, and demand that Cation Henson should make amends. Canon Henson replied to the letter in a sermon in which he said ho was entirely justified in the charges he had made. When the directors took ever the business from Arana. they retained men who, as their own representatives subsequently confessed, were murderers, pirates, and bandits. The directors ought to have hastened to Peru personally and done soineth : ng at once. [Canon Henso-i on August 4 quoted from the London 'Times' of "December 7, 1908, which published a two column advertisement setting out the prospectus of the Peruvian Amazon Company, Limited. This showed that the capital "was one million, divided into 300,000 7 per cent, participating cumulative prefeience shares and 700,000 oidiiiiuy share* of £1 each. The preference shares carried the right to a fased cumulative preferential dividend at the rate of 7 per cent, por annum, and to 20 per cent, of the surplus profits remaining after paying a, dividend at the late o! 7 per cent, per annum on ordinary shares. The company was formed in 1907 for the acquisition as a going concern of the export, import, and general business of Messrs J. C. Arana and Hermaiios, of Iquitos (Peru) and Manaos (Brazil). The! prospectus set out that •• the exportation ! of lubber is not the only source of wealth of the Putumayo Territory. Resides its valuable fruits, there aie extensive plains surrounded by navigible rivers available for pasture, lands and agriculture, while parts of the territory contain auriferous quartz and gravel and deposits, ot coal and other minerals, all of which add to the sources of wealth, and tie capable of development within Putcmayo. Between the > Governments of Peru, Colombia, and j Ecuador there is at present pending a j boundary question, which, even should it j affect politically a portion of the Putumayo Territoiy, will not affect the legal ; rights of the eettler. For this reason, j however, the rights in the Putumayo Ter- j ritoi-y, although the property of the company, have been entirely excluded from ; the calculation of assets and profits. In j the Putumayo district Messrs Arana have j established 45 centres for rubber collec- j tion. surrounded by cultivated lands hav- j ing a population of about 40.000 Indians, j who are-.gradually being taught to improve j the crude methods which were previously used of treating'the rubber, and thereby raising the quality of the rubber produced.''] I

THE SARAWAK FIELDS

Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright.

LONDON, August 25. (Received August 26. at 9.10 a.m.)

The 'Pall Mall Gazette' supports the Rajah of Sarawak's determination to prevent the oil and rubber lands belonging to the people falling into the hands of wholesale foreign capitalists. The wouldbe exploiters consider the conditions the Rajah has imposed in the interests of the natives as much too stringent.