THE CENTUBY PLANT 223 



utilization of agaves for fiber is of rather small importance. Never- 

 theless, considerably more than a million dollars' worth of so-called 

 ' ixtle ' fiber is marketed in Mexico each year, in addition to a very 

 large quantity used locally for lassoes and other cordage and the like. 

 From the port of shipment, ixtle is commonly known as Tampico fiber. 

 Our imports for the last three years average about one and a quarter 

 million dollars in value. Unlike henequen, this is the product of 

 several distinct plants, of which a number belong to the very different 

 genera Yucca, Samuela and Hesperaloe, and in the tropics the name 

 is also applied to Bromelia fiber; but the larger part of the Tampico 

 fiber is obtained from two dwarf species of A gave. Comparatively little 

 of it comes from large plantations, except in the warm region above 

 Tampico, where extensive jdanting is now being undertaken — and a 

 large part of the exported ixtle is obtained from this district. Aside 

 from its Hesperaloe (' Zamandoque ') and Samuela (' Palma Zaman- 

 doque") constituents, the longer grade of Tampico fiber — which even 

 then is shorter than henequen — seems to be produced chiefly by an 

 agave spontaneous as well as cultivated in the state of Tamaulipas, and 

 known botanically as A. Funhiana. In the cooler country, especially 

 in the states of Coahuila and Nuevo Leon, a shorter fiber is obtained 

 from the closely related wild ' lecheguilla/ the native name of which 

 has been adapted by botanists into Agave Lecheguilla. 



On the plantations, and possibly to a very slight extent elsewhere, 

 the fiber is cleaned by machinery, much as henequen is ; but a great deal 

 of it is still prepared laboriously by hand. It is here the central bud 

 or ' cogollo ' of young leaves, which is used, and not the harder old ones, 

 and the pulp is removed from the fiber by means of a hand scraper of 

 metal used against a supporting block of wood. 



In the northern part of the republic, where, as in western Texas, 

 lecheguilla is extremely abundant over a large area, the extracted 

 fiber, sometimes used for brushes, bath pledgets, etc., is usually spun by 

 hand into cords or these into ropes on a primitive rope-walk, a child 

 twirling the strands as they grow from the apron-like bag of fiber 

 carried by the spinner. This is the common cordage of the country, and 

 is used for tying purposes, lariats and the like, as well as to make 

 sacking, saddle-bags, and the head-yokes with which the human beast 

 of burden always goes provided in that land. Visitors to Monterey 

 are often interested in the rope-walks, which may be seen anywhere 

 in the outskirts of the city, as well as in the manufacture of the 

 lecheguilla cord into coarse bagging which is effected in an equally 

 laborious and simple manner — the cord being woven into oblong mats 

 which are then folded across the middle and stitched down the sides, 

 everything being done by hand. The charm of these simple sights 

 to the tourist is largely enhanced by the general friendliness of the 

 workers, who are usually willing to chat or be photographed and whose 



