328 A YEAR OF COSTA RICAN NATURAL HISTORY 



In front of the offices and beneficio was a large paved 

 courtyard, where the logs were piled in sawing time and later 

 the ox-carts full of coffee waited their turn to discharge their 

 loads of red cherry-like berries. Many beneficios have a 

 finca or farm belonging to them, on which is raised at least 

 a part of the coiTee beneficiated, although all buy coffee 

 from other growers in addition. El Brazil, however, had no 

 finca and the entire quantity of coffee (nearly 5000 fanegas, 

 equalling 575 000 pounds or 4000 sacks) was purchased. 

 The number of small landowners and coffee growers in Costa 

 Rica is very great and everyone who had any coffee to sell 

 must be dealt with and bargained with separately — at El 

 Brazil there were over six hundred growers to deal with. 

 The competition between the different beneficios ran very 

 high and to get the most coffee without paying for it a price 

 that prevented any profit made the purchasing of this coffee 

 fruit an art in itself. 



Dr. Karl Sapper, after dwelling in Guatemala for some 

 years and traveling throughout Central America, pointed 

 out in 1902 the great advantage which Costa Rica possesses 

 in the predominance of small landowners, in contrast with 

 the conditions prevailing in the larger countries in that part 

 of the world. Where many own small pieces of ground, a 

 much greater and more general interest in the prosperous 

 development of commerce and of peaceful progress exists 

 than where there are only a few great landowners and the 

 great mass of the population, having nothing to lose, are 

 more indifferent and more easily drawn in the wake of po- 

 litical adventurers. 



When we went to El Brazil in December the dry season 

 had begun. The coffee was ripe on many farms and the 

 picking, which is done by hand, mostly by women and girls, 

 was in full swing. The coffee trees looked very pretty, 

 with their glossy dark green leaves and showy bright red 



