The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1883-05-17
Sugar Culture.

Su3ar-cane produces no natural seed,
but is propagated from cuttings placed
in shallow trenches through the fields
two or three feet apart. The young
plants spring from the joints of the
buried cane, and continue thus to grow
for several years without new plant
ings, somewhat after the manner of the
asparagus of our Northern climes. But
each year the growth becomes inferior,
until the planting has at last to be re-
newed. Though at first having to be
weeded, while the ground is kept clear,
the cane is soon left to itself when once
it begins to shade the soil so as to pre-
vent the growth of obstructive plants.
Most curious of all is the change that
ensues as soon as the cane begins to
ripen at its lower Joints. Then the long,
sWord-like leaves that surround the I'M
der part of the stalk loosen one by one.
Finally they drop off, and as joint after
joint softens the dry leaves make Il
tangled thick mattress on the ground
covering thousands of acres and highly
inflammable. Readers of this letter
viii many of them recall the frequent re-
ports telegraphed during the late Cuban
rebellion of the immense destruction
caused by firing the sugar plantations.
The explanation is to be found in the ease
with which a whole sugar crop can be set
in flames by a touch of the match to this
Jungle of dry leaves that underlies
and penetrates the standing cane. Fire
is the Cuban planters nightmare. A
careless toss of a half-burned cigarette,
a spark from Negroes cabin, an ignited
match, may signify the loss of years
crop and absolute ruin. Most danger
Gus of all, a reveugeful negro has it in
his power often to inflict a loss of tens
of thousands of dollars on his employer.
! | have heard of one of the clever devices
which the negro uses to fire plantations
and at the same time prove an alibi.
He takes a light box, with q candle set
within it. Equipped with this and a
bunch of matches, he crawls to the cen
| ire of a sugar-cane tract. He then so
| fixes the candle that it must burn
! through the box before the flame can
reach the matted cane leaves. A touch
of the match does the rest, and the fugi-
tive has time TO escape and appear
among the working hands long before
| the distant smoke and spreading flames
! warn the planter of the impending ca
lamity. "A sugar crop has to be watched
| like a baby" said Cuban planter, re
Gently, speaking to me of cane culture.
If danger is apprehended, the watchers
/ guard it at every point, and short shrift
/ is given the black man ever caught in
/ the inCendiarY act. If he reaches the
/ courts, his chances are far better than
( those given him by the quick bullet of
4 the guard.
/ Outside of this peril of fire can not
| find that sugar culture is more precari-
| Gus than other agricultural industries.
! But it exhausts the soil rapidly, so
/ that its fertility needs constant renewal
/ by manures; and plantation of three
OF four thousand acres, with its one or
two hundred hands, its scores OF OK
/ teams. its costly machinery, sugar
! house, casks, cultivators, and various
! appurtenances, needs vast amount of
working capital / have heard of one
/ of these sugar farms on which the sugar
mill alone, with its improved machine
~, cost 5000, 600 Some of the largest
| planters even 90 to the expense of ram
/ flying the cane tract with narrow
/ gauge railroads, some of them TWO or
three miles long, to bring the cane
| economically to the crushing mills.
| Americans who have lived here in Cuba
all agree as TO the ordinary character of
| the sugar planter. He is kindly, hos
| pitable, courteous, and very often an
| educated and refined gentleman. But
| he is dreadfully improvident and waste
| full The $50, 900 or more which he may
make in a good sugar year is often dis
| sipated in Havana before the next year
/ begins. His plantation is apt to be
/ loaded with debt, and this, with the
/ stupendous taxes that he pays and his
persistency in never looking ahead, ex-
plains the miserable plight in which SO
| many of the rich Cuban sugar farms
are found at the present time.-HaUaaG
/ COr N Y Past