78 THE CHINESE SUGAR CANE. 
not to an estate exclusively set aside for the purposes 
mentioned, but merely as relating to that portion of 
every sugar estate, necessarily set apart for the raising of 
cattle, and for such crops of grain or fodder as are 
intended for its own consumption. 
There are about two thousand five hundred sugar 
estates, large and small, to be found on the island of Cuba, 
ranging in size from the one having only fifty, to the 
one with over fifteen hundred acres of cane field under 
cultivation. ‘These are the extremes, however ; the aver- 
age of the whole island would not exceed one hundred 
and fifty to two hundred acres of growing cane to each 
estate ; requiring to cultivate these, and carry on profita- 
bly the business of the plantation, without overworking 
the negroes, about one negro to every two acres. Many 
planters, however, manage to get along with fewer hands 
than this; but where a good field hand is worth from 
eight hundred to one thousand dollars, it must be evident 
that the over-work which ensues from planting more cane 
than the gang can conveniently handle, in the end proves 
the most expensive economy the planter can adopt. 
& 
SOIL. 
The soil of Cuba has two marked characteristics of 
color, depending upon the locality where each is found: 
the one, and most striking, is of a deep red or Spanish 
brown hue, which pigment it much resembles, soiling 
every thing which it touches of a ruddy tint—the legs of 
the horses and cattle, as well as the clothes of the culti- 
vators; the other soil is a rich black mould or humus, 
