Morning journal and courier., 1888-06-09
IN OTHER LANDS,

IN OTHER LANDS.
 | The Coffee Fields of Cuba-Acres Upon l Acres of the Productive Trees-An Industry Which is Rich i'm Results The Work Of a Coffee Plantation Big Pref1ts From the Cultnre-A Pic turesque DescriptieR of a Prosy Hut Interesting Theme.
 VALE DEL AGUAcATF, Cuba, June 4. ! To the Editor of the JOURNAL AND COURIER:
 From an earnest study of the subject dur | ing this visit to, and in previous periods of travel in Cuba, I believe that one-half of the entire southern slope of the island is eul- tivable as the finest coffee-lands of the world If but one-third should be so that would equal an area of nearly eight thousand square miles, or over five million acres. Supposing the United States owned Cuba. After one billion dollars in valuable commer- ciaf woods had been cleared and sold note it's value for coffee culture. One acre of land will sustain an average growth of four hun- dred coffee trees. A low estimate of the an nual yield would be one pound of marketa- ble coffee per tree, or four hundred pounds per acre. That would equal 8 possible an nual yield of one billion pounds. or five hun dred thousand tons-but one hundred thou sand tons less than the annual production of coffee in all countries, and nearly three times the amount annually consumed in the United States This is no dream. It is far more possible under United States ownership of Cuba than that the one hundred and fifty thousand odd square miles of Dakota, which in 1868 was regarded by good authorities as valueless desert-land, should within two de- cades become the vast and exhaustless grana- ry of nation.
 COFFEE CULTURE
 All natural conditions favoring precisely this stupendous development exist within the region described. Just such vast area, not hundredtf part of it under cultivation to-
 day, lies at the proper altitude, from one to three thousand feet above the sea. Soil, cii-
 mate, protection from chilling winds, are all
 properly provided. An exhaustless vegeta-
 ble soil of from ten to thirty-six feet, as in the Guines valley, covers the entire area.
 The climate is more perfect for coffee culture
 than in the famed Arabian wales of Yemen. No chilling winds cross the central Cuban mountain ranges to injure bloom or bud, or fruit or berry; upon these gentle slopes which ever turn their radiant reaches to the
 warm and glowing sun. But one reason ex- 1 ists why, as ours, competing with no present or possible future development of our own, | and adding incalculable wealth and resource | to oar nation, it could not become the coffee garden of the globe. Spain, exercising the most barbarous and brutal governmental powers known this side of the dark ages, 8 curse and insult to nineteenth-century civili-
 zation, threateningly sits at our very doors, robbing the properties, destroying the ambi- | tions and efforts, and sucking the very life.
 blood, from 8 brave and kindly people, half
 century ago ours by every yaloroEs effort and holy aspiration that can stir the souls of
 men. And we, nation of emasculated pre- tensiorists, higgle-ha2gle over internal dead | issues of wraithful past, and pothering over sentimental issues of a century to
 come, cowardly beyond human expression, permit the danger, loss and shame.
 According to De Tour the original stock of all West India coffee was a coffee-tree pre- sented by the magistrates of Amsterdam to
 Louis XIV, in 1715. and thence introduced into Hayti and San Domingo by the French Haytiens. Its introduction here was from Hayti It's chief stimulus came through | hundreds of rich refugees from the constant
 revolutions in Hayti and San Domingo; and | probably coffee-culture reached it's greatest prosperity in Cuba during the first quarter of this century, when its annual production reached nearly an hundred million pounds. Then it was that the planters of these noble valleys were richer than princes; frequently | owned thousands of slaves each; lived in a lavish luxuriance, the lingering legends of which are unreliable from their apparent ab-
 surdity in the practical thought of to-day;
 and old Trinidad, down there in it's somno- l lence by the sea- was the then "Paris chiqui- | to, or sTittle Paris" of the Antilles, whose l wealth, splendor and prohigacy will forever
 remain unequalled in the new world.
 | But by 1895 the enormous profits on sugar were a temptation to neglect coffee; and by 1 1850 the annual product of Cuba barely | reached fifteen million pounds. Then came | the Cuban revolution of '6s, and for eight 1 terrible years the struggle for freedom from 1 Spanish rule, whose greatest sacrifices and l most desperate ventures were made among the valorous Cubans of this region, was fur 1 ther harm to coffee culture; and since the 1 patched-up peace of Zanjon the magnificent 1 coffea-lands of Cuba have lain practically l idle beneath the robberies of the Spanish off, | ficials and the desperate enervation of plant 1 CTS, who see no hope but in the strong suc- | cor of the United States government, and hope against hope in the face of our own in difference and compassionless silence. With l been an appreciable renewal of efforts in this direction. The continued low prices of su- l gsr and losses and harrassments of sugar. l planters, have effected an exchange of indus tries; many owners of coffee-lands hoping for some solt of relief from the United
 States, or any foreign power that would as sure respectable government; and the invest
 ment of many millions of American capita in coffee fAcas or properties with the same hope of American recognition of American
 interests, have put this industry of stupen. dous practical possibilities in what may bt best described 8 tentatively expectant
 state. If we should buy, or take Cuba to day, within five years time this whole south
 ern Cuban slope would become bed oi
 snow white coffee-bloem; and the one hun dred and seventy-6ve thousand tons of cof-
 fee annually consumed by the citizens of the
 United States would be delivered to these
 consumers by our own citizens, who woulC then furnish it at a cost of but trifle more
 than one-half that now paid-or, say re
 duetion of at least ten cents per pound. Thi,
 would effect an annual saving to the whol'
 people of between thirty and forty million
 dollars. Thus only three years equal saving
 on this one ltemi net taking into account th' | vast increase of national wealth in the acqui
 sition of many equally valuable Cuban re
 sources, would buy Cuba outright. Half tn,
 sum of one years' savings would take it Suppose portion of that mighty and trou
 blesome surplus at Washington, which, a estimated by Secretary Fairchild in Decem Der last, will reach Gone hundred and fort.
 million dollars at the end of this fiscal ysar,
 be applied to making Cuba one of our United
 States.
 THE WORK ON COFFEE PLANTATION. Coffee culture is not difficult It is yer.
 profitable. And coffee plantation in bloon is the most beautiful spot on earth. If , planter decides to begin at the beginning an'
 create his own ':fnca," or coffee plantation there is first the selection of ground. Thi is not difficult, for coffee thrives anywher in proper climate and fairly well-draine { soil A level surface is not necessary though usually chosen. Hillside reaches an
 even hillocks answer admirably. The selec
 ton of seed is simply matter of choice B Seeding is carried on after this fashion: A a especially rich bit of ground is chosen whel