276 ia 
On the high lands the gathering of the crop begins in April or May, 
and continues till September. We should remember that the greater 
part of the Brazilian Empire lies south of the equator, and the whole of 
it south of the thermal equator, consequently, its seasons are antipodal 
to ours. The berries are dried mostly by exposure to the hot sun, 
though some farmers employ furnaces. Terraces or sheds, with an ele- 
vation in the center, are covered with the fruit and kept exposed until 
perfectly dry. This process produces the thick-hull, or sun-dried coffee. 
Some farmers take the berries immediately to the press, and after thor- 
oughly pressing and washing them, expose them on terraces or sheds 
till perfectly dry. Others, again, keep them steeped for several days 
in water prior to drying, in order that the hulls may come off more 
readily. By the last two methods the washed or pulpless coffee is pro- 
duced. The hulling process is performed by machinery, the cylindrical 
hullers being preferred to the disk hullers, as the former do not crush the 
seed. American machines, especially those of Ledgerwood & Co., are 
mostly used in hulling, screening, and polishing the berry. Some of 
these machines have been known to clean over eight thousand pounds 
of coffee in ten hours. The Albion coffee-huller cleans from twelve 
hundred to fifteen hundred pounds in twelve hours. 
Coffee is mostly exported from four leading ports: Rio de Janeiro, — 
Santos, Bahia, and Ceara. Rio de Janeiro coffee, either upland or bot- 
tom land, is graded as superior, good firsts, ordinary firsts, low firsts; 
good seconds, and low seconds. Santos coffee, when well prepared, is 
considered as first class. That of Ceara is about equal to Laguayra cof- 
fee in European markets. Bahia coffee, though inferior, finds access to 
some markets, and is graded 8, SS, and SSS, 
England and Italy prefer the aromatic washed coffee of Brazil; Rus- 
sia, Denmark, and part of Germany, the bitter sun-dried article. Brazil 
furnishes more than half the coffee consumed by the world’s population, 
and much of it is sold under brands of Mocha and Java coffee. The 
popular preference for these Asiatic brands, then, has but a slender 
basis of fact upon which to rest, and is very apt to be imposed upon by 
the Brazilian product, the qualities of which, by their growing excel- 
lence, tend to keep alive this popular prejudice. In 1800 Rio Janeiro 
exported only 10 sacks; in 1820, 97,500 sacks; in 1830, 391,785 sacks ; 
in 1840, 1,068,418 sacks; in 1850, 1,343,484 sacks; in 1860, 2,127,219 
sacks; in 1870, 2,209,456 sacks; in 1874, 2,675,281 sacks. The exports 
of the province of Bahia rose from about 100,000 pounds, in 1810,+to 
nearly 120,000,000 in 186970. From 1869 to 1872 Santos, in the prov- . 
inee of San Paulo, exported over 200,000,000 pounds. In 1870 the proy- 
ince of Espirito Santo exported 1,150,000 pounds. The province of Ceara 
raised its exports from about 57,000 pounds, in 1839, to 2,703,000 pounds 
in 187071. These figures show an immense productive power in this 
interest, to which much capital and enterprise have been attracted from 
the United states. 
LATE ENGLISH AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENTS.—Professor Wright- 
son, of the Royal Agricultural College at Cirencester, gives the follow- 
ing results of experiments on the college farm under his direction in the 
culture of swedes: 
1. That poor land and in poor condition derives the greatest benefit from artificial 
dressings. 
2, That land in high condition has been proved, in many cases, to derive little or no 
benefit from the use of artificial dressings. 
3. That land in this neighborhood appears to be satisfied with moderate dressings, 
and the use of heavier dressings is not attended with commensurate results. 
