The times., 1899-08-06
With TEE CIGARMAKHRS
A Tour Through the Largest Fac
tory in the World.

Prominent Persons Who Have Visit
ed the Hourodez Establishment in
Havnna-WOnderfuI System EN-
ployed i'm Conducting an Immense
Business-Prices Paid to Experts.
Trinidad de Cuba, July 9.-You cannot
! be said to have done" this island OF TIA
bacco puro'' until you have visited typ
icaI fabrica and inspected the whole proc
ess of converting the weed into the fra
grant rolls big and little, beloved of most
| men and many women. Perhaps the best
place in which to pursue your investiga-
tons is the great Fabrica de Honradez, in
Habana-the word honradez being Spanish
for honesty" The factory occupies an
entire city square, from Cuba Street to San
Ygnacio, and in prosperous times turned
out something over 2,5o0,000 cigars and
cigarettes per diem.
On entering the building you are met
by courteous gentleman of Chesterfield
ian department who speaks pigeon Eng
lish after the Cuban fashion, and whose
sole avocation In life is to exhibit this es-
| tablishment. First he shows you through
the counting-rooms and offices, and then
| introduces you to the register, an enor-
nous tome containing thousands of
names, and begs you to append your own.
! What a treasure-trove to the autograph
hunter that volume would be! On leaving
the building each visitor is again conduct
| ed to the register and asked to write op-
posite his name his opinion of the fac
tory. with remarks on the peculiarities
that have impressed him and any criti-
| cisms or suggestions he may feel disposed
| to offer.
] Among a multitude of signatures you
may read the names of w. H. Prescott NJ
| Charney' Kingsley, Darwin, Agassiz, and
host of other shining lights of past gen
erations, followed by those of later date,
together with their hastily formulated
opinions Some of the latter are amusing;
others frivolous, concerning the pretty girls
employed, or their appreciation of liberal
donation OF the products of the place;
while few are in the ponderous style OF
! William H. Seward, who wrote: 81 am
deeply impressed with the successful man
ner in which the proprietor of La Honra-
| dez has combined West Indian productions
with Americans inventions, European tall
ent and Asiatic industry"
Had our former Secretary OF State been
writing the same today, he would have
substituted native and African for Asiatic,
because where formerly a thousand Chi
nese coolies were employed there are now
fifty. In La Honradez, about half the
| workmen are of African descent and the
color line has never been drawn. At least
| one third of the saddle-hued, called by
courtesy white" employees are SpaDiaTds,
and to this day it is so difficult to keep the
| Cubans from quarreling with them that
they are grouped by themselves in sepa-
rate rooms whenever practicable. AL
| work by the piece. from eight 10 ten hours
day; and the average earning is $3.50 a
day-a few experts making as much as
So per diem. Besides their wages, most OF
| them are lodged free Of COST and all are
allowed to smoke as many cigars or ciga-
| rettes as they like, of the masters tobac-
co and their own making-an item of nc
small consequence to the proprietor, wheI
a thousand men are smoking every minute,
and only the best tobacco that grows, ci-
gars from which retail at not less than e
cents apiece
In the great room where cigarettes arr
made each of the several hundred workmeI
is seated before tiny table, on which ht
folds, fills, counts and does up in package!
the fragrant little rolls. 1t is astonishing
what accuracy and dexterity they acquire
from long practice in handling and counting
these small bits of paper. Watch thost
whose business IL is TO enclose twenty-five
cigarettes in a package, just as they ar,
bought in the United States; you will SCI
that they seem TO do il by instinct, withou
counting, but determining by q single touci
of the fingers if there is one cigarette NOR
or less than the required number. Just sucl
marvellous dexterity do old employees in tn,
Bureau of Engraving and Printing a
Washington acquire counting coupons il
the United States Treasury, and other i'm
portant work for Uncle Samuel.
One small room, full of silent, bus,
Asiatics, looked like & nightmare, All tn
grotesque figures, clad in blue dunguree
with eyes set in on the bias and head
clean -shaven, or with pigtails carefull
twisted up in Psyche knots or coarse, blacl
hair cut short and standing up like tn
bristles in a blacIing brush-are scrupu
lousy neat in their persons and attire, be
ing required TO keep so by the rules OF tn
establishment. The dormitory where tn
contract laborers sleep is a model of clean
illness and good order, its cots with snow
white spreads and pillows, and its Gu
rious personal belongings of these exile
from the fiowery kingdom. Scattered abou
the room are little Chinese gods, exquislt
carvings instruments of alleged music
gambling boards, funny shoes of wood an
straw and fans galore.
All the workmen are required to wear
certain hat with la Honradez" stampe
on the band; there is rigorous system, i
the shape of fines for any infringement c
E | rules or dereliction of duty, and eyerythin
! goes on with military precision. One cd
feature common to all Cuban cigar facto
ries, is the reader-a man employed o
purpose to entertain the others. He occu
pies a kind of pulpit, erected near the cen
tire of the main room, and reads forenoo
and afternoon. two hours at a time fror
newspapers and current literature. Excit
| ing political questions are tabooed, 70
manifest reasons, and it is the genera
testimony that much better work is don
{ during the reading hours than at othe
$ times Strikes are lamentably frequent, es
l pecially among the Cuban employees VIII
5 work themselves up into high state c
r excitement on the slightest proyocation. A
| rule however, the strikes are not sc
rious or of long duration the tempest "a
: teapot rage, which soon blows over bein
Latin characteristic. The cigarmaker
2 have their unions, called gremios, whic
r are almost as prolific of mischief as thos
of the United States, and, In the interes
/ | of law and order, should be sternly sup
pressed by the strong hand of the Govern
ment in any country.
The women and girls employed in strip
. | ping the leaf have a large airy apartment
/ | TO themselves, and how their tongues d