Introduction of Sugar-Cane. -- Sugar Plantations. -- Mode of
Manufacture. -- Slaves on the Plantations. -- African
Amusements. -- The Grinding Season. -- The Coffee
Plantations. -- A Floral Paradise. -- Refugees from St.
Domingo. -- Interesting Experiments with a Mimosa. -- Three
Staple Productions of Cuba. -- Raising Coffee and Tobacco. --
Best Soils for the Tobacco. -- Agricultural Possibilities. --
The Cuban Fire-Fly. -- A Much-Dreaded Insect. -- The Ceiba
Tree. -- About Horses and Oxen.
The first sugar plantation established in Cuba was in 1595, nearly
three hundred years since. These plantations are the least attractive
in external appearance, but the most profitable pecuniarily, of all
agricultural investments in the tropics, though at the present writing
there is a depression in prices of sugar which has brought about a
serious complication of affairs. The markets of the world have become
glutted with the article, owing to the enormous over-production in
Europe from the beet. The plantations devoted to the raising of the
sugar-cane in Cuba spread out their extensive fields, covered with the
corn-like stalks, without any relief to the eye, though here and there
the graceful feathery branches of the palm are seen. The fields are
divided off into squares of three or four acres each, between which a
roadway is left for ox-teams to pass for gathering purposes. On some
of the largest estates tramways have been laid, reaching from the
several sections of the plantation to the doors of the grinding-mill.
A mule, by this means, is enabled to draw as large a load as a pair
of oxen on plain ground, and with much more ease and promptness.
About the houses of the owner and the overseer, graceful fruit trees,
such as bananas and cocoanuts, with some flowering and fragrant
plants, are grouped, forming inviting shade and producing a
picturesque effect. Not far away, the low cabins of the blacks are
half hidden by plantain and mango trees, surrounded by cultivated
patches devoted to yams, sweet potatoes, and the like. Some of the
small gardens planted by these dusky Africans showed judgment and
taste in their management. Chickens and pigs, which were the private
property of the negroes, were cooped up just behind the cabins. Many
of these plantations employ from four to five hundred blacks, and in
some instances the number will reach seven hundred on extensive
estates, though the tendency of the new and improved machinery is to
constantly reduce the number of hands required, and to increase the
degree of intelligence necessary in those employed. Added to these
employees there must also be many head of cattle,--oxen, horses, and
mules. The annual running expenditure of one of these large estates
will reach two hundred thousand dollars, more or less, for which
outlay there is realized, under favorable circumstances, a million
five hundred thousand pounds of sugar, worth, in good seasons, five
cents per pound at the nearest shipping point.
There are a few of the small estates which still employ ox-power for
grinding the cane, but American steam-engines have almost entirely
taken the place of animal power; indeed, as we have shown, it will no
longer pay to produce sugar by the primitive processes. This creates
a constant demand for engineers and machinists, for whom the Cubans
depend upon this country. We were told that there were not less than
two hundred Bostonians at the present time thus engaged on Cuban
estates. A Spaniard or Creole would as soon attempt to fly like a bird
as to learn how to run a steam-engine or regulate a line of shafting.
It requires more intelligence and mechanical skill, as a rule, than
the most faithful slaves possess. A careful calculation shows that in
return for the services of this small band of employees taken from our
shores, this country takes eighty per cent. of all the sugar produced
upon the island! Twelve per cent. is consumed by peninsular Spain,
thus leaving but eight per cent. of this product for distribution
elsewhere.
During the grinding season, which begins about the first of December
and ends in April, a large, well-managed sugar plantation in Cuba is a
scene of the utmost activity and most unremitting labor. Time is
doubly precious during the harvesting period, for when the cane is
ripe there should be no delay in expressing the juice. If left too
long in the field it becomes crystallized, deteriorating both in its
quality and in the amount of juice which is obtained. The oxen
employed often die before the season is at an end, from overwork
beneath a torrid sun. The slaves are allowed but four or five hours
sleep out of the twenty-four, and being worked by watches during the
night, the mill does not lie idle for an hour after it is started
until the grinding season is closed. If the slaves are thus driven
during this period, throughout the rest of the year their task is
comparatively light, and they may sleep ten hours out of the
twenty-four, if they choose. According to the Spanish slave
code,--always more or less of a dead letter,--the blacks can be kept
at work in Cuba only from sunrise to sunset, with an interval of two
hours for repose and food in the middle of the day. But this is not
regarded in the sugar harvest season, which period, after all, the
slaves do not seem so much to dread, for then they are granted more
privileges and are better fed, given more variety of food and many
other little luxuries which they are known to prize.
On Sunday afternoons and evenings on most of the plantations the
slaves are given their time, and are permitted, even in the harvest
season, to amuse themselves after their own chosen fashion. On such
occasions the privilege is often improved by the blacks to indulge in
native African dances, crude and rude enough, but very amusing to
witness. The music for the dancers is supplied by a home-made drum,
and by that alone, the negro who plays it being to the lookers-on
quite as much of a curiosity as those who perform the grotesque
dances. This humble musician writhes, wriggles, twists himself like a
corkscrew, and all the while beats time, accompanying his notes with
cries and howls, reminding one of the Apache Indian when engaged in a
war dance. It is astonishing to witness to what a degree of excitement
this negro drummer will work himself up, often fairly frothing at the
mouth. A buxom wench and her mate step forward and perform a wild,
sensuous combination of movements, a sort of negro can-can, like those
dancing girls one sees in India, striving to express sentiments of
love, jealousy, and passion by their pantomime, though these negroes
are far less refined in their gestures. When these two are exhausted,
others take their place, with very similar movements. The same
drummer labors all the while, perspiring copiously, and seeming to get
his full share of satisfaction out of the queer performance. This is
almost their only amusement, though the Chinese coolies who have been
distributed upon the plantations have taught the negroes some of their
queer games, one, particularly, resembling dominoes. The author saw a
set of dominoes made out of native ebony wood by an African slave,
which were of finer finish than machinery turns out, delicately inlaid
with ivory from alligators' teeth, indicating the points upon each
piece. We were told that the only tool the maker had with which to
execute his delicate task was a rude jack-knife. We have said that the
negroes find in the singular dance referred to their one amusement,
but they sometimes engage among themselves in a game of ball, after a
fashion all their own, which it would drive a Yankee base-ball player
frantic to attempt to analyze.
The sugar-cane yields but one crop in a year. There are several
varieties, but the Otaheitan seems to be the most generally
cultivated. Between the time when enough of the cane is ripe to
warrant the getting-up of steam at the grinding-mill and the time when
the heat and the rain spoil its qualities, all the sugar for the
season must be made; hence the necessity for great industry on the
large estates. In Louisiana the grinding season lasts but about eight
weeks. In Cuba it continues four months. In analyzing the sugar
produced on the island and comparing it with that of the
mainland,--the growth of Louisiana,--chemists could find no difference
as to the quality of the true saccharine principle contained in each.
The Cuban sugar, compared with beet-sugar, however, is said to yield
of saccharine matter one quarter more in any given quantity.
In society the sugar planter holds a higher rank than the coffee
planter, as we have already intimated; merely in the scale of wealth,
however, for it requires five times the capital to carry on a sugar
estate that would serve for a coffee estate. Some of the large sugar
plantations have been owned and carried on by Jesuit priests--we were
about to write ex-Jesuit priests, but that would not be quite correct,
for once a member of this order one is bound to it for all time. The
priest or acknowledged member of the organization may be forced for
prudential reasons to temporarily change his occupation, but he cannot
sever himself from the responsibilities which he has once voluntarily
assumed. There was a time when much of the landed and fertile property
of the island was controlled by the Church,--in fact owned by it,
though often by very questionable titles. The original owners, under
cunning pressure, perhaps on a threatened death-bed, were induced to
will all to the Church; or as an act of deep penance for some crime
divulged at the confessional, they yielded up all. To preserve this
property and possibly to cause it to produce an income for the Church,
certain priests became active planters. Extreme ecclesiastic rule, as
has been said, is greatly modified in Spain and her colonies, the
natural reaction of the hateful days of the Inquisition.
As the sugar plantation surpasses the coffee in wealth, so the coffee
estate surpasses the sugar in every natural beauty and attractiveness.
A coffee plantation, well and properly laid out, is one of the most
beautiful gardens that can well be conceived of, in its variety and
loveliness baffling description. An estate devoted to this purpose
usually covers a hundred acres, more or less, planted in regular
squares of one acre or thereabouts, intersected by broad alleys lined
with palms, mangoes, bananas, oranges, and other fruits; as the
coffee, unlike the sugar cane, requires partial protection from the
ardor of the sun. Mingled with the trees are lemons, limes,
pomegranates, Cape jasmines, and a species of wild heliotrope,
fragrant as the morning. Occasionally in the wide reach of the estate
there is seen a solitary, broad-spreading ceiba, in hermit-like
isolation from other trees, but shading a fragrant undergrowth.
Conceive of this beautiful arrangement, and then of the whole when in
flower; the coffee, with its milk-white blossoms, so abundant that it
seems as though a pure white cloud of snow had fallen there, and left
the rest of the vegetation fresh and green. Interspersed in these
fragrant alleys dividing the coffee plants is the red of the Mexican
rose, the flowering pomegranate, the yellow jasmine, and the large,
gaudy flower of the penon, shrouding its parent stem in a cloak of
scarlet. Here too are seen clusters of the graceful yellow flag, and
many wild flowers, unknown by name, entwining their tender stems about
the base of the fruit trees. In short, a coffee plantation is a
perfect floral paradise, full of fragrance and repose.
The writer's experience was mainly gained at and about the estate of
the late Dr. Finley, a Scotch physician long resident upon the island.
He had named his plantation after the custom with a fancy title, and
called it Buena Esperanza. Here was seen the mignonette tree twenty
feet high, full of pale yellow and green blossoms, as fragrant as is
its little namesake, which we put in our conservatories. There were
also fuchsias, blue, red, yellow, and green, this last hue quite new
to us. The night-blooming cereus was in rank abundance, together with
the flor de pascua, or Easter flower, so lovely in its cream-colored,
wax-like blossom. The Indian poui, with its saffron-colored flowers,
was strikingly conspicuous, and there too was that pleasant little
favorite, the damask rose. It seemed as if all out-doors was an exotic
garden, full of marvelous beauty. What daily miracles nature is
performing under our only half-observant eyes! Behold, where the paths
intersect each other, a beautiful convolvulus has entwined itself
about that dead and decaying tree, clothing the gray old trunk with
pale but lovely flowers; just as we deck our human dead for the grave.
It was the revolution in San Domingo which gave the first great
stimulus to the culture of the coffee plant in Cuba, an enterprise
which has gradually faded out in the last decade, though not
absolutely obliterated. The refugees from the opposite shore sought
shelter wherever they could find it among the nearest islands of the
Archipelago, and large numbers made their new homes in the eastern
department of Cuba, near the cities of Trinidad and Santiago. Here
they turned lands which had been idle for three and four centuries
into smiling gardens, and the production of the favorite berry became
very profitable for a series of years, many cargoes being shipped
annually to this country from the two ports just named. The production
of sugar, however, has always maintained precedence, dividing the
honor to-day only with tobacco in the manufactured state. Coffee does
not figure to any extent in the statistics of exports. Exorbitant
taxation and the cruel ravages of civil war, in the coffee districts
especially, are largely the cause of the loss of an important and
profitable industry.
Some amusing experiments with a mimosa or sensitive plant served to
fill a leisure hour at Buena Esperanza, under our host's intelligent
direction. It grew wild and luxuriantly within a few feet of the broad
piazza of the country-house. Close by it was a morning-glory, which
was in remarkable fullness and freshness of bloom, its gay profuseness
of purple, pink, and variegated white making it indeed the glory of
the morning. It was a surprise to find the mimosa of such similar
habits with its neighbor, the morning-glory, regularly folding its
leaves and going to sleep when the shades of evening deepened, but
awaking bright and early with the first breath of the morn. So
sensitive is this most curious plant, so full of nerves, as our host
expressed it, that it would not only shrink instantly, like unveiled
modesty, at the touch of one's hand, but even at the near approach of
some special organisms, ere they had extended a hand towards it. Five
persons tried the experiment before the sixth illustrated the fact
that touch was not absolutely necessary to cause the leaves to shrivel
up or shrink through seeming fear. Our host even intimated that when
the mimosa had become familiar with a congenial person its timidity
would vanish, and it could be handled gently by that individual
without outraging its sensibility. Of this, however, we saw no
positive evidence. If Mr. Darwin had supplemented his chapters on the
monkey by a paper relating to the mimosa, he might possibly have
enabled us to find a mutual confirmation in them of some fine-spun
theory.
The three great staple productions of Cuba are sugar, the sweetener;
coffee, the tonic; and tobacco, the narcotic of half the world. The
first of these, as we have shown, is the greatest source of wealth,
having also the preference as to purity and excellence over any other
saccharine production. Its manufacture also yields molasses, which
forms an important article of export, besides which a spirituous
liquor, called aguardiente, is distilled in considerable quantities
from the molasses. The cane, which grows to about the size of a large
walking-stick, or well-developed cornstalk, is cut off near the ground
and conveyed in the green state, though it is called ripe, to the
mill, where it is crushed to a complete pulp between stones or iron
rollers. After the juice is thus extracted the material left is spread
out in the sun to dry, and is after being thus "cured" used for fuel
beneath the steam-boilers, which afford both power to the engine and
the means of boiling the juice. Lime-water is employed to neutralize
any free acid as well as to separate the vegetable matter. The
granulation and crystallization are effected in large flat pans, or
now more commonly by centrifugal machines, rotating at great speed. It
is then crushed and packed either in hogsheads or in boxes for
exportation; canvas bags are also being largely employed, as they are
easier to pack on board ship, and also to handle generally. A
plantation is renewed when deemed necessary, by laying the green canes
horizontally in the ground, when new and vigorous shoots spring up
from every joint, showing the great fertility of the soil.
Coffee was introduced by the French into Martinique in 1727, but it
did not make its appearance in Cuba until forty years later, or, to be
exact, in 1769. The decadence of this branch of agriculture is due
not only to the causes we have already named, but also to the inferior
mode of cultivation adopted on the island. It was predicted some years
before it commenced, and when the crash came the markets of the world
were also found to be greatly overstocked with the article. While some
planters introduced improved methods and economy in the conduct of
their estates, others abandoned the business altogether, and turned
their fields either into sugar-raising, fruits or tobacco. Precisely
the same trouble was experienced in the island of Ceylon, which was at
one time a great coffee-raising centre, but now its planters are many
of them abandoning the business, while others adopt new seed and new
methods of culture. In Cuba it was found that the plants had been
grown too closely together and subjected to too close pruning, while
the product, which was gathered by hand, yielded a mixture of ripe and
unripe berries. In the countries where coffee originated, a very
different method of harvesting is adopted. The Arabs plant the
coffee-shrubs much farther apart, allow them to grow to considerable
height, and gather the crop by shaking the tree, a method which
secures only the ripe berries. After a few weeks, or even days, the
field is gone over a second time, when the green berries have become
fit to gather, and readily fall to the ground.
A coffee estate well managed, that is, combined with the rearing of
fruits and vegetables intermingled, thus affording the required shade
for the main crop, proves fairly profitable in Cuba to-day, and were
this industry not hampered and handicapped by excessive taxes, it
would attract many new planters. The coffee ripens from August to
December, the nuts then becoming about the size of our cherries. The
coffee-berry is the seed of the fruit, two of which are contained in
each kernel, having their flat surfaces together, surrounded by a soft
pulp. The ripe berries are dried by exposure to the sun's rays, then
bruised in a mill, by which means the seeds are separated from the
berry. They are then screened to cleanse them, after which they are
bagged, and the coffee is ready for market. Some planters take great
care to sort their crop by hand, in which operation the negro women
become very expert. By dividing the berries into first and second
qualities as to size and cleanliness, a better aggregated price is
realized for the entire harvest. Not only are the coffee estates much
more pleasing to the eye than the sugar plantations, but they are also
much more in harmony with the feelings of the philanthropist. There is
here no such exigency in getting in the harvest, leading to the
overwork of the slaves, as on a sugar estate in the grinding season.
Indeed, we were assured that it was quite possible to carry on a
coffee estate with white labor. When, heretofore, a negro has been
brought to the block in Havana, or any other Cuban city, the price
realized for him has always been materially affected by the question
whether he had been employed on a sugar estate in the grinding season.
If he had been thus employed it was considered that his life has been
unduly shortened, and he sold accordingly at a lower price. At the
present time few negroes are bought or sold, as their market value has
become merely nominal. There is no good reason why white labor is not
suited to the coffee and tobacco estates. When the field labor upon
the sugar estates is almost wholly performed by machinery, that is,
the cane cut by a reaper, there will be so much less exposure to the
sun that white hands, under proper management, can perform it.
Tobacco, indigenous to both Cuba and the United States, is a great
source of revenue upon the island. Its cultivation involves
considerable labor and expense, as the soil must be carefully chosen
and prepared, and the crop is an exhaustive one to the land; but the
cultivation does not require machinery, like sugar-cane, nor quite so
much care as does the growing coffee. It is valued in accordance with
the locality from which it comes, some sections being especially
adapted to its production. That of the greatest market value, and used
in the manufacture of the highest-cost cigars, is grown in the most
westerly division of the island, known as the Vuelta de Abajo (Lower
Valley). The whole western portion of Cuba is not by any means
suitable to the production of tobacco. The region of the best tobacco
is comprised within a small parallelogram of very limited extent.
Beyond this, up to the meridian of Havana, the tobacco is of fine
color, but of inferior aroma. From Consolacion to San Christoval the
tobacco is very "hot,"--to use a local phrase,--harsh, and strong, and
from San Christoval to Guanajay the quality is inferior up to Holguin
y Cuba, where better tobacco is produced. The fertile valley of Los
Guines produces poor smoking-tobacco, but an article excellent for the
manufacture of snuff. On the banks of the Rio San Sebastian, are also
some estates which produce the very best quality of tobacco. Thus
it will be seen that certain properties of soil operate more directly
in producing a fine grade of tobacco than any slight variation of
climate. Possibly a chemical analysis of the soil of the Vuelta de
Abajo would enable the intelligent cultivator to supply to other lands
the ingredients wanted to make them produce equally good tobacco. A
fairly marketable article, however, is grown in nearly any part of the
island. Its cultivation is thought to produce a full ten per cent.
upon the capital invested, the annual crop of Cuba being estimated in
value at about twenty-three million dollars. The number of tobacco
planters is said to be about fifteen thousand, large and small. On
many tobacco farms the labor is nearly all performed by white hands.
Some coolies and some negroes are also employed even on small estates.
When it is remembered that so small a portion of the land is under
cultivation, and yet that Cuba exports annually a hundred million
dollars worth of sugar and molasses, besides coffee, tobacco, fruits,
and precious woods, it will be realized what might be accomplished,
under a liberal system of government, upon this gem of the Caribbean
Sea. Cacao, rice, plantains, indigo, and cotton, besides Indian corn
and many nutritious vegetables, might be profitably cultivated to a
much larger degree than is now done. It is a curious and remarkable
fact, suggesting a striking moral, that with the inexhaustible
fertility of the soil, with an endless summer that gives the laborer
two and even three crops a year, agriculture generally yields in Cuba
a lower percentage of profit than in our stern Northern latitudes,
where the farmer has to wrench, as it were, the half-reluctant crop
from the ground. It must be remembered that in Cuba there are numerous
fruits and vegetables not enumerated in these pages, which do not
enter into commerce, and which spring spontaneously from the fertile
soil. In the possession of a thrifty population the island would be
made to blossom like a rose, but as it now is, it forms only a garden
growing wild, cultivated here and there in patches. None of the fine
natural fruits have ever been improved by careful culture and the
intelligent selection of kinds, so that in many respects they will not
compare in perfection with our average strawberries, plums, pears, and
peaches. Their unfulfilled possibilities remain to be developed by
intelligent treatment.
The plantain, which may be said to be the bread of the common people,
requires to be planted but once. The stem bears freely, like the
banana of the same family, at the end of eight months, and then
withering to the ground renews itself again from the roots. Sweet
potatoes once planted require care only to prevent their too great
luxuriance, and for this purpose a plough is passed through them
before the wet season, and as many of the vines as can be freely
plucked up are removed from the field. The sugar-cane, on virgin soil,
will last and prove productive for twenty years. The coffee shrub or
tree will bear luxuriantly for forty or fifty years. The cocoanut palm
is peculiar to all tropical climates, and in Cuba, as in the Malacca
Straits and India, bears an important share in sustaining the life of
the people, supplying milk, shade, and material for a hundred domestic
uses. It grows in luxuriant thriftiness all over the island, in high
and low land, in forests, and down to the very shore washed by the
Gulf Stream. It is always graceful and picturesque, imparting an
oriental aspect to everything which surrounds it. It is estimated
that over ten million acres of native forests, covered by valuable
wood, still remain untouched by the woodman's axe, especially on and
about the mountain range, which extends nearly the entire length of
the island, like the vertebræ of an immense whale.
About the coffee plantations, and indeed throughout the rural portions
of the country, there is a curious little insect called a cocuyo,
answering in its general characteristics and nature to our firefly,
though it is quadruple its size, and far the most brilliant insect of
its kind known to naturalists. They float in phosphorescent clouds
over the vegetation, emitting a lurid halo, like fairy torch-bearers
to elfin crews. One at first sight is apt to compare them to a shower
of stars. They come in multitudes immediately after the wet season
sets in, prevailing more or less, however, all the year round. Their
advent is always hailed with delight by the slave children, as well as
by children of a larger growth. They are caught by the slaves in any
desired numbers and confined in tiny cages of wicker, giving them
sufficient light in their cabins at night for ordinary purposes, and
forming the only artificial light permitted them. We have seen a
string of the little cages containing the glittering insects hung in a
slave-cabin in festoons, like colored lamps in fancy-goods stores in
America. The effect of the evanescent light thus produced is very
peculiar, but the number of insects employed insures a sufficiently
steady effect for ordinary purposes. These little creatures are
brought into Havana by young Creole children and by women, for sale to
the ladies, who sometimes in the evenings wear a small cage hung to
the wrist containing a few of the cocuyos, and the light thus produced
is nearly equal to a small candle. Some ladies wear a belt of them at
night, ingeniously fastened about the waist, others a necklace, and
the effect is highly amusing. In the ballroom they are worn in the
flounces of ladies' dresses, where they glisten very much like
diamonds and other precious stones. Strange to say, there is a natural
hook near the head of the firefly, by which it can be attached to the
dress without apparent injury to it. The town ladies keep little cages
of these insects as pets, feeding them on sugar, of which they appear
to be immoderately fond. On the plantations, when a fresh supply is
desired, one has only to wait until evening, when hundreds can be
secured with a thread net at the end of a pole. By holding a cocuyo up
in the out-door air for a few moments, large numbers are at once
attracted to the spot. In size they are about an inch long, and a
little over an eighth of an inch in breadth.
There is an insidious and much dreaded insect with which the planters
have to contend on the sugar and coffee plantations, but which is not
met with in the cities; namely, the red ant, a much more formidable
foe than any one not acquainted with its ravages would believe. These
little creatures possess a power altogether out of proportion to their
insignificant size, eating into the heart of the hardest wood, neither
cedar, iron-wood, nor even lignum-vitæ being proof against them. They
are not seen at the surface, as they never touch the outer shell of
the wood whose heart they are consuming. A beam or rafter which has
been attacked by them looks as good as when new, to the casual
observer, until it is sounded and found to be hollow, a mere shell in
fact. Even in passing from one piece of timber to another, the red
ant does so by covered ways, and is thus least seen when most busy.
The timbers of an entire roof have been found hollowed out and
deprived entirely of their supporting strength without the presence of
the insect enemy being even suspected until chance betrayed the
useless character of the supports. For some unknown reason, upright
timbers are rarely attacked by them, but those in a reclining or
horizontal position are their choice. These destructive red ants are
nearly always to be found in tropical countries, as in India, Batavia,
and Sumatra, where they build mounds in the jungle half the size of
the natives' cabins. They may be seen marching like an invading army
in columns containing myriads across the fields of southern India.
The interior landscape, more particularly of the middle district of
the island, is here and there ornamented by fine specimens of the
ceiba, or silk-cotton tree, which is often seen a hundred feet in
height, with stout and widespread branches, giving the idea of great
firmness and stability. It sends up a massive sinewy trunk for some
fifty feet, when it divides into branches covered with a dense canopy
of leaves, expanded like an umbrella, and forming a perfect shade
against the power of the torrid sun. The ceiba is slow of growth, but
attains to great age, specimens thriving when Columbus first landed
here being, as we were assured, still extant. Next to the royal palm,
it is the most remarkable of all the trees which loom up beneath the
brilliant purple skies of Cuba. The negroes have a superstition that
the ceiba is a magic tree haunted by spirits, a singular notion also
shared by the colored people of Nassau, though these two islands are
so many hundreds of miles apart and have never had any natural
connection. There is certainly something weird in the loneliness and
solitary grandeur of the tree. Next to the palm and ceiba in beauty
and picturesqueness of effect is the tamarind tree, with its deep
green and delicate foliage, presenting a singular and curious aspect
when thickly looped on every branch with hanging chocolate-colored
pods.
Under the noonday sun, sitting in the deep shade of some lofty ceiba,
one may watch with curious eyes the myriads of many-hued, broad-winged
butterflies, mingling orange, crimson, and steel-blue in dazzling
combinations, as they flit through the ambient atmosphere with a
background of shining, evergreen foliage, the hum of insects and the
carol of birds forming a soft lullaby inviting sleep. Naturalists tell
us that no less than three hundred distinct species of butterflies are
found in Cuba, ranging in size from a common house-fly to a
humming-bird. The day dies with a suddenness almost startling, so that
one passes from sunshine to starlight as if by magic. Then the cocuyo
takes up the activity of insect life, flashing its miniature torches
over the plantations, and peeping out from among the dense foliage,
while the stars sing their evening hymn of silent praise.
The Cubans have a peculiar mode of harnessing their oxen, similar to
that seen in the far East and also in some parts of Europe, as at San
Sebastian, on the Bay of Biscay. A stout wooden bar is placed at the
root of the horns, and so securely bound to them with thongs that the
animal draws, or rather pushes, by the head and frontlet, without
chafing. The Cuban oxen have a hole pierced in their nostrils, through
which a metallic ring is secured, and to this a rope is attached,
serving as reins with which to guide the animal. This mode of
harnessing certainly seems to enable the oxen to bring more strength
to bear upon the purpose for which they are employed than when the
yoke is placed, as is the case with us, about the throat and
shoulders. The greatest power of horned animals undoubtedly lies in
the head and neck, and the question arises whether in placing the yoke
on the neck and breast we do not get it out of reach of the exercise
of that strength, and cause the animal to draw the load behind him by
the mere force of his bodily weight and impetus. The West Indian
animal is small, and often of the cream-colored breed, mild-eyed and
docile, of which one sees such choice specimens in Italy and
especially on the plains of Lombardy.
Not quite satisfied with the conclusion first arrived at, we gave this
subject of the harnessing of oxen a second consideration, and in
carefully watching the operation of the frontlet-bar we detected at
least one very cruel and objectionable feature in this mode of
harnessing. The animals are necessarily so bound to the bar that to
move their heads one way or the other is a simple impossibility, while
our mode of yoking oxen leaves them very much at liberty in the use of
their heads, thus enabling them to shake off flies and other biting
insects which may tease them, whereas the eyes of a Cuban ox are often
seen infested with flies which he cannot get rid of while in harness,
however he may be beset by them. This alone, in a climate where biting
insects swarm all the year round, is a most serious objection to the
frontlet-bar as compared with the yoke.
The Cuban horse deserves more than a mere mention in this connection.
He is a remarkably valuable animal, especially adapted to the climate
and to the service required of him. Though small and delicate of limb
he can carry a great weight, and his gait is not unlike that of our
pacing horses, though with much less lateral motion, and is remarkably
easy for the rider, certainly forming the easiest gait combined with
rapidity of motion possessed by any breed. He has great power of
endurance, is a small eater, requiring no grain as a general thing,
but is satisfied with the green leaves and stalks of the corn, upon
which he keeps in good condition and flesh. He is a docile little
creature, easily taught and easily taken care of. The Cuban horse
knows no shelter except the heavens above him, for there are no barns
in Cuba; but he will no more wander away from his master's door, where
he stands at nearly all hours of the day with the saddle on his back,
than would a favorite dog. The Montero inherits all the love of his
Moorish ancestors for the horse, and never stirs abroad except upon
his back. He considers himself established for life when he possesses
a good horse, a sharp Toledo blade, and a pair of silver spurs. Being
from childhood accustomed to the saddle, it is natural for him to be a
good rider, and there are none better even in Arabia. He is apt to
tell big stories about his little horse, intimating its descent direct
from the Kochlani, or King Solomon's breed, and to endow it with
marvelous qualities of speed and endurance. The Montero is never heard
to boast of his wife, his children, or any other possession, but he
does "blow" for his horse.
One of this class stood beside his pony one warm afternoon opposite
the Hotel Telegrafo, where a few of the guests were seated under the
broad veranda. The sleek, well-formed animal elicited some
complimentary remarks, which gratified the owner, who spoke English
after the style of his people. He indulged in praises of the horse,
especially as to the ease and steadiness of his gait, and offered a
bet that he could ride round the outside of the Campo de Marte on him
and return to the spot where he stood, at ordinary speed, carrying a
full glass of water without spilling a tablespoonful of the liquid;
such is the ease of motion of these animals trained to what is called
the paso gualtrapeo. Four corners were to be turned by the Cuban, as
well as half a mile of distance accomplished. The small bet suggested
was readily taken, and the full tumbler of water brought out of the
house. The Cuban mounted his pony and rode round the park with the
speed of a bird, easily winning his bet.
The visitor, as he proceeds inland, will frequently observe on the
fronts of the dwellings attempts at representations in colors of birds
and various animals, resembling anything rather than what they are
apparently designed to depict. The most striking characteristics are
the gaudy coloring and the remarkable size. Pigeons present the
colossal appearance of ostriches, and dogs are exceedingly elephantine
in their proportions. Space would not be adequate to picture horses
and cattle. Especially in the suburbs of the cities this fancy may be
observed, where attempts at portraying domestic scenes present some
original ideas as to grouping. If such ludicrous objects were to be
met with anywhere else but in Cuba they would be called caricatures.
Here they are regarded with the utmost complacency, and innocently
considered to be artistic and ornamental. Noticing something of the
same sort in Vevay, Switzerland, not long since, the author found on
inquiry that it was the incipient art effort of a Spanish Creole, who
had wandered thither from the island.
The policy of the home government has been to suppress, so far as
possible, all knowledge of matters in general relating to Cuba;
especially to prevent the making public of any statistical information
regarding the internal resources, all accounts of its current growth,
prosperity, or otherwise. Rigidly-enforced rules accomplished this
seclusiveness for many years, until commercial relations with the
"outside barbarians" rendered this no longer possible. No official
chart of Havana, its harbor, or that of any other Cuban city has ever
been made public. Spain has seemed to desire to draw a curtain before
this tropical jewel, lest its dazzling brightness should tempt the
cupidity of some other nation. Notwithstanding this, our war
department at Washington contains complete drawings of every important
fortification, and charts of every important harbor in Cuba. Since
1867 we have been connected with Cuba by submarine cable, and through
her with Jamaica since 1870. The local government exercises, however,
strict surveillance over telegraphic communications.
The political condition of Cuba is what might be expected of a
Castilian colony, ruled and governed by such a policy as prevails
here. Like the home government, she presents a remarkable instance of
the standstill policy, and from one of the most powerful and wealthy
kingdoms of Europe, Spain has sunk to the position of the humblest and
poorest. Other nations have labored and succeeded in the race of
progress, while her adherence to ancient institutions and her
dignified contempt for "modern innovations" have become a species of
retrogression, which has placed her far below all her sister
governments. The true Hidalgo spirit, which wraps itself up in an
antique garb and shrugs its shoulders at the advance of other nations,
still rules over the realm of Ferdinand and Isabella, while its
high-roads swarm with gypsies and banditti, as tokens of decaying
power.