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Show down and leads the cutters through the jungle, hacking a road to the tree. If precious woods did not enter into the dreams of Spanish treasure-hunters, precious metals did. And in comparatively recent years Honduras has been giving substance sub-stance to the dreams. Ten years ago the value of the republic's gold exports was but $4,220. In 1940 the figure stood at S63,975. Honduras today is the second largest larg-est Central American producer of gold. Near Tegucigalpa, capital of the Republic, is the famous Rosario mine of San Juancito. In other departments de-partments are old Spanish mines, still rich, and many underdeveloped underdevelop-ed deposits of gold, silver, copper, cop-per, antimony, mercury, lead and iron. Home of the Timber King, Honduras Hon-duras also produces the plebian banana, her largest export crop. Bananas grow wild in almost every part of the country up to an elevation ele-vation of 3,000 feet. Cultivation of the fruit for export is confined to the rich, hot lands along the north coast. Export shipments from Puerto Cortez and other ports run close to thirteen millions of bunches bunch-es a year, with the United States taking about four-fifths of the total. Mountainous throughout, Honduras Hon-duras has been handicapped for centuries by lack of land trons-portation. trons-portation. Denied for this reason normal access to ports and markets, mar-kets, the people pioneered in air freight transport, and established a pattern that has been followed extensively by her neighbors. In Honduras it is not uncommon to find the freight plane carrying to market an amazing variety of ore, coffee, fruit, and livestock in' exchange for manufactured commodities com-modities from other lands. Honduras is a country of remarkable re-markable scenic beauty. Between the various branches of the mountains moun-tains that rise to 10,000 feet are extensive valleys and plateaus, fertile fer-tile and well-watered. The most famous is the highly productive plain of Comayagua, 40 miles long. Careful planning by a forward-looking forward-looking government, which is giving giv-ing particular attention to problems prob-lems of transport peculiarly difficult diffi-cult in so rugged a country, is steadily taking advantage of great natural opportunity for immense crops of cacao, cotton, sugar cane, coffee, tobacco, fruits and other tropical and sub-tropical products. A population now well past the million mark still looks to other countries to meet its needs in cotton cot-ton goods, foodstuffs, chemicals, shoes, machinery, tools, and iron and steel products. KNOW YOUR ' xSI NEIGHBOR .RA.U. HONDURAS Home of the Timber King They fell the mahogany by the light of the waning moon. The fact that the wood of the Timber King of the tropics is best if -the tree is felled at night and when the moon is in its last quarter quar-ter may have come down from an ancient civilization which flourished flourish-ed centuries before Cape Honduras Hondur-as became New World threshold for Columbus. However and whenever mahogany mahog-any wood and moon phase first became connected, modern botany supports as fact what once was thought to be no more than native superstition. It has been found that the mahogany tree is soundest, sound-est, most free from sap and of richest color if cut at night when the moon is on the wane. Recognition Recogni-tion of the curious fact accounts in no small measure for the fame of Honduran mahogany wherever choice woods are in demand. And mahogany, though by no means predominant in an appraisal of the potential wealth of Honduras, is certain to play an increasingly important im-portant part in the republic's commerce com-merce and prosperity. ' True mahogany, the familiar dark-colored wood of solid furniture furni-ture and fine veneer, is supplied to the world by a tree native to Mexico, Central America, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela, and the islands is-lands of the Caribbean. With a growing life of 200 years or more, it may reach a height of a hundred feet and attain a girth that five men with joined hands can hardly encircle. There is no such thing as a mahogany grove. True monarch of the forest, the tree grows in splendid isolation, rearing its branches crownlike above surrounding sur-rounding growth. The mahogany huntsman climbs to some limb that will give him a view of the forest roof. He marks the mahogany by its yellow-reddish leaves, climbs |