Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-08-05

brings his money here and loans 1t to
these Porto Rican coffee men will get
high rates of interest, and in time have
chance at the land itself.
No one should come TO raise coffee with
out he has enough to buy his land and to
keep himself and his workmen for the first
four years. He should have as much as
$4,000 to establish almost any kind OF
plantation. and above that the more the
better. He could not take hundred acres
Of land and bring it into coffee bearing
within five years for much less than $2I.-
$50. At the end of that time his profits
would come in rapidly, and he would prob
ably be able to make from II to % per
cent on his investment for many years.
How Coffee is Grown fn Porto Rico.
Sc far l have seen no well-cultivated
coffee plantations in Porto Rico In Brazil
the coffee estates are like gardens. The
trees trimmed. They grow in great
bushes in regular rows which plowed
and hoed and kept free from weeds The
plants are first grown in nurseries and
carefully set out. Here the most of the
plants are from the seeds which fall to
the ground. They set out without
order. being shaded for the first year by
banana plants and after that by larger
trees The result is they grow tall and
sDindlng, with trunks like pipe stems.
The coffee trees begin to flower in April.
Soon green berries take the place of the
blossoms and by October there is wealth
OF rich, red cOffee cherries SHINING out OF
the green leaves. The coffee berry is of
just the size Of a cherry. 1t grows close to
the branch rather than on stem, like a
cherry. In each cherry are two of the half
round coffee beans of commerce. They are
the seeds of the cherry.
The coffee berries do not all ripen at the
same time. The trees must be picked over
again and again during the season, and cot
fee picking forms of the chief indus
tries of the island 1t is in the picking sea-
son that the poems make the most of their
Mt,
from three to four months, and men. wo-
men and children are seen among the
bushes picking the berries into baskets and
carrying them off to the factory on their
heads The little ones pick the berries on
the lower stems. while the men and women
bend down the taller trees and gather the
ones higher up. The picking upon many of
the plantations is done by the pound, the
usual price being about a cent and half
per pound. 1t takes good picker to aver
age 30 pounds day, but the whole fam
lily can work at it the peon does fairly we'll
in the coffee regions at picking time.
In the Coffee Factories.
I find the Porto Rican coffee factories
quite different from those of Brazil. The
most of them are rude in the extreme
They have not the fine machinery nor the
economical methods of the Brazilians.
In Brazil the berries are first mashed to
a pulp, which takes off their flesh. The
seeds beans are taken out and dried in
their way to the market. There the ma
chinery is run by steam. Here oxen and
men take the place of machinery, and the
methods of prepara ton for the market are
slow and expensive.
The berries are first stored away in the
great plantation house factory of the
planter. The buildings rude in the ex-
IRENE. They are usually high up on piles,
and so arranged that fiat boxes, some of
which as large as city lot, can
be rolled at wiz in and out from under the
floor These great tags are used for dry
ing the coffee beans after the flesh has been
taken off of them. 1t is necessary that the
coffee should not be rained upon while dry
ing, and the showing it under the building
protects it from tie heavy dews of the
night.
In some PLACES the coffee is dried on
cement floors, but it requires from two
such floors have to be covered UP at time
of rain, and the coffee is often taken in at
night.
The getting the seeds out of the berry is
interesting. This is done by wheel or
roller which moves over the berries so adj
justed that it will mash the berries but not
crush the seeds. AS soon as the seeds have
been freed from the pulp they are dried
They are still covered with two thin shells
which must be removed before thew arc
ready for shipment. This is done i'm hull
ing mills, and the beans are then polished
by running over and through them great
wheels faced with tin. The wheels are 50
adjusted that they do not fnjure the coffee
beans, but by rubbing them over and over
FURNISH them so that they shine as If var
nished. In some mills coloring matter Is
added to give the coffee a blue tint.
Much of the hullipg of the coffee Is dome
In great mortars mace OF wood. men stand
ing before them and letting great nestIes
drop on the coffee. thus breaking the shells
These wooden mortars are of about the
height of your waist. I see them every.