SUGAR CANE 135 



fire break, and by properly spacing the early cuttings 

 much can be done to safeguard the cane fields from 

 fire, which is an enemy more dreaded than any other 

 by the Cuban planter. As stated before, this sys- 

 tem has not as yet been tested for a long term of 

 years, but it is giving most excellent results, not 

 only in decreasing cost but in increasing production, 

 and it promises to do much to prolong the produc- 

 tive life of the cane fields. It is the only system of 

 cane cultivation that has ever satisfactorily solved 

 the troublesome question of the proper and economi- 

 cal disposition of the trash ; and it seems to promise 

 that Cuba will continue to be in the future, as it 

 long was in the past, the country of cheajDCst sugar 

 production. 



Methods of Cultivation: Other American Coun- 

 tries. — The sugar business is an old established 

 industry in most of the other tropical American 

 countries. In all of them, however, the tendency is 

 to cling too closely to old methods of hand labor. 

 Even in Porto Rico, where the business is now 

 largely in the hands of American capitalists, work- 

 men may be seen laboriously opening deep holes for 

 planting cane with the hoe, and this, too, on lands 

 that are perfectly adapted to the use of the best im- 

 plements. The same dependence on the hoe or ma- 

 cliete is to be found in all of these other countries. 

 This is not so much due to lack of knowledge on the 

 part of the owners as it is to the supposed difficulty 

 of teaching the native laborers the use of improved 

 implements. This, it must be admitted, is often a 

 difficult task; but that it is not impossible is shown 



