The daily state chronicle. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 188?-1891, 1890-04-05
OUR MEXICO LETTER.
LUSCIOUS FRUIT IN ABUNDANCE
ALL THE YEAR ROUND.

LtSC1OUS RUlI IN ABU NDANCE
ALL THE YEAR ROUND.
How the Maguey and Coffee Plants
Grow--Some Interesting Notes aud
Sketches of that Interesting Country.
Especial Cor STATE CHRoNICLE.]
The most interesting thing in farming
which attracts the stranger in Mexico is
the ''maguey" plant, which is what We
know as the century plant or the cactus,
of which they make "pulque,' which is
a white beer, and will only keep, like
the mama of the Israelites, three days
The plant grows all over the republic of
Mexico, wherever it can get dirt to livG
in; but the larger district is southeast
from the city of Mexico, the centre of
which is Apan. They obtain the plant
from the offshoots of the old plants.
They will hedge the field in all around
first, and make fence OF it; they
will then make rows sixty feet apart,
and that year they will use the inter-
mediate ground for small grain. /
think they then take up the plants from
year to year, and add more rows until
there are about eight hundred plants to
the acre. They take care that not too
many plants ripen at the same time; at
the end OF three or four years, as the
plant shows that it is going to shoot it's
stalk to make the flower and seed, they
cut cut the bud, and each morning a
man with q long gourd sucks out the
contents of that hill, which in a good
plant would be six quarts. On the side
of him is his burro or donkey with four
pig skins on his panier into which he
empties the contents of his gourd
When the skin is full it looks like a
hog just as he is about to put on gam
brels, and just as clean and white. |
have heard it had been a my>tery how
''the apple got into the dumpling," but
| tried to find out how they got the
pig out of the skin. And Why this
skin wouldn't damage the beer
that will not keep but three
days and why the beer does not
rot the skin, are facts that |
could not find out. The pig is then car
ried AID the contents emptied in hun
dred gallon barrel, and during the night
it goes TO the city. The plant lasts sixty
days and yields ninety gallons, whioh
! sells from eight to ten cents per gallon.
! One narrow gauge railroad from Puebla
to Mexico derives an income from this
freight Of 1900 per day The beer
tastes good, has small amount OF
spirit, but has bad smell. They also
make from the root a strong cordial,
which | have seen retailed by the fruit
vender at the car door at q cent q glass
still, after visiting cities III Mexico with
a population combined OF one million,
saw only two tipsy men. They were
both poems, going home from market.
There is also hbre derived from the
leaf of this plant, and they take very
long leaves, say about 6 feet long and
s inches wide, lay them on the ground
and fill them with water in this high
altitude and the evaporation is so quick
that it will form ice before morning.
Coffee grows at about four thousand
feet altitude around the coast both east
and west. The plats are of about ten
acres, and look very much like ohinque
pin thicket. The trees are all sapings
and l was told that they were about
forty years old 1t flowers in the 1attel
part of March, and the fruit IS mature
at the beginning Of the next March. Il
grows in little clusters around the ioiu1
of each twig, and looks very much like
the cranberry. They plant their frui
trees so as to shade it; the orange
lemon and the mango; they cultivate i
| entirely with the hoe. When ripe it i
picked off by Indians standing on a step
ladder, and it is dried on the ground Q
on mats, and then is run through
machine which breaks the skin and the7
they winnow it.
The banana grows in the adjoinin.
land and looks like huge corn stalk. 1t
. leaves are much wider. At two year
old it pushes out its blossom at the en-
of the upper stem. The bloom is abou
the size Of small nubbin of corn Som
J are purple and some bright pink, and a
9 each leaf unfolds it shows seven stamens
: and, when the pollen drops, it falls upo
a what appears to be the small end Of III
t banana When the fruit develops in.
t it's green state it is cut and used by th
e natives just as it is shipped to u.s.
e Sugar is very readily produced in NOR
If than half the Republic, and they expol
it largely. 1t is planted about once
eighteen years. The sugar cane grow
sixteen feet high.
Tobacco that | saw vas a small lea
II it was air-dried and at Orzab;; Gene,
a Grant said that the cigars were the ae
;. in the world.
Cotton is grown very easily. The
produce seventy per cent, of what the
5, require and they have ninety-two lar.
3. mills. This year they produced all TIE
. wanted. 1t is worth about fourteen al
" =, a half cents gold and eighteen cents S
IL yer. There is very heavy duty {
1T raw cotton. They told lie they piantt
"a once in three or four years. 1t is pr
duced by irrigation. The seed is carrie
to the oil mills. The oil is used for soa
The cake is exported to England.
didn't hear of any fertilizer being use
Oh but the large number Of animals th
} they keep will, to some extent, furni
manure.
he The fruit crops are everywhel
he oranges, lemons (sour and sweet, ma
90 pops, pomegranates, melons and de
" berries all the year round, and | "
ut offered cucumbers and I saw that th
as were not pulled till they were full riI