Puerto Rico is a country of farmers. Nearly five-sixths of the people
live in the country. Their homes are scattered along the valleys, on the
hills, and even on the mountain tops; for the land is fertile
everywhere.
[Illustration: THE PUERTO RICAN FARMER IN TOWN.]
We have seen the homes and home life of the people in the city. Now let
us take a jaunt out into the country to see how the farmers and the
plantation laborers live.
Here is a farmer now, coming down the street. He is on his way to the
market. His horse is a thin, mean-looking little beast. His produce is
carried in baskets, and his machete is sticking out of one of these.
This machete he always carries with him. He could not get along without
it. It is a large, long, clumsy knife, something like a corn-cutter.
Sometimes he uses it to cut a way for himself and pony through the
forest, or on the bridle paths overgrown with plants and vines after the
rainy season.
When he has sold his load of vegetables and fruit, we will ride out with
him to his home and visit some of the plantations.
We saw many peasant farmers and laborers in the market place, and found
them polite, shrewd, bright in conversation, but very ignorant and
somewhat indolent.
They are quite content with their way of living, and take no thought for
the future. A Puerto Rican farmer thinks himself rich and fortunate if
he owns a horse, a cow, some game-cocks, a gun and an acre of land.
He is simple in his tastes and buys little in the market. His rice
flour, corn meal and coffee he has prepared at home, by pounding in
wooden mortars or grinding between stones.
His patch of land he plants with corn, sweet potatoes and other
vegetables. Bananas, plantains and other fruits grow wild and may be had
for the picking.
His vegetables, fruit and poultry he takes to the market and sells, but
only when compelled to do so by necessity.
This money is spent for clothing or other articles, or perhaps lost in
gambling.
Only the lightest kind of clothing is necessary; for the coldest days
are not so cold as our mild autumn days.
The dress of the farmer consists of a cotton jacket, white shirt and
check pantaloons. His head is protected from the hot rays of the sun by
a large broad-brimmed hat. This is made from the grass which grows
around his doorway. No shoes are needed.
The dress of his wife is a simple white cotton gown, and his children
wear no clothes at all.
[Illustration: HOME OF A PEASANT FARMER OF THE BETTER CLASS.]
The houses or homes of the peasant farmers are nearly all alike. They
are built in a few days, from poles and royal palm bark. They are
thatched with leaves of the palm or with grass. These huts are usually
divided into two rooms.
There are no chimneys, often no windows, and but one door. A very poor
house, you think; but then it is only intended for a shelter. It shields
them from the damp and cool winds of night and the daily rains of the
rainy season. At other times they live outside.
There is no stove, and of cooking utensils there are few. The cooking is
done for the most part outside the house, when the weather is dry, on a
sheet of iron or in an iron kettle. The food is served in gourd dishes
and eaten with gourd spoons.
During the rainy season the people live in great discomfort. The
cooking must be done inside the hut at this time. As there is no
chimney, the room is soon filled with smoke, which can only escape
through the openings under the eaves.
Would you like to see the furniture of one of these poor cabins? It
consists of a few calabash shells used for eating vessels; some rude
earthen pots; a tin cup, perhaps; two or three hammocks made of the bark
of the palm tree, and a machete.
Bunches of dried herbs and gourds dangle on the walls, but there are no
pictures, curtains, or ornaments of any kind.
At night the people sleep on the floor, or in hammocks. They spend much
of the day also in swinging to and fro in their hammocks, smoking, and
playing on their guitars and other native musical instruments.
By the door the family dog and the naked babies tumble in the dirt.
Perhaps there is a pig and some poultry; but there is sure to be a
game-cock or two.
Near the house is the garden. In this are raised sweet potatoes, beans,
squashes, muskmelons, peppers, gourds, calabashes, bananas and
plantains.
The farmers we see at work have their oxen harnessed to rude plows by
the horns. The ground is so rich it is not necessary to plow it very
deep.
An acre of good land here will produce more vegetables and fruit than in
most other countries.
Riding through the country we see plantations of coffee, sugar cane or
tobacco, and also stock farms. Puerto Rico is fertile from the mountain
tops to the sea. It is rich in pasture lands, shaded with groves of palm
trees, and watered by hundreds of streams.
Here and there herds of horses and cattle and flocks of sheep graze on
the plains. When we approach the flocks of sheep, we discover a very
curious thing. The wool on these sheep is not at all like the wool on
the sheep raised in our own country. It is more like the hair of the
goat.
Cattle are highly valued by the people, not only for dairy and food
purposes, but as beasts of burden and draft.
Outside of the large plantations, crops are raised on a small scale; and
modern implements and machinery are almost unknown.
[Illustration: A MOUNTAIN VILLAGE IN PUERTO RICO.]
Most of the land is divided up into very small farms or garden patches,
or is taken up by groves.
In the interior of the country are many little villages, shut out from
the rest of the world. We reach them by the narrow horse-trails that
wind in and out among the mountains.