436 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



several, and they eaid that one person would thus 

 eheil from 4 to 5 fanegas, that is, about from eight 

 to ten bushels in a day, and that they received a 

 rial lor each fanega ; that is, from the 4ih to the 

 5th of a dollar per day ; but they do not earn such 

 wages at every kind ol work. The crop of maize 

 appeared, from the quality of the grain, to have 

 been a fine one, and one ol" the persons told me 

 that it had yielded at the rate of about 50 bushels 

 an acre. The olives on the trees we. examined, 

 in the neighborhood of the convent, did not appear 

 to have suffered so much as those of Xeres. The 

 man who showed us the presses, said that there 

 was no such thing as a failure in the crop of olives 

 every second year. He said they had all suffered 

 very much this year in conse(iue,nce of the rams 

 in summer, but ihat even this year Iheir olives 

 had not failed. On returning we si ruck off into a 

 field where a lot of men and horses were employ- 

 ed in treading out millet. There were nme horses, 

 and a driver to every three. They were dri- 

 ven round the circle all abreast ; the whole super- 

 ficies of a very large circle, from the centre out- 

 wards, being covered with the tops of the millet 

 which had been cut ofi' with very little of the straAv. 

 They had begun about mid-day and would finish 

 at ni<fht. The produce would be about 80 fanegas 

 — 160 bushels. Many of the fields in this neigh- 

 borhood are cultivated with corn crops under the 

 olive trees, and they say that the crop is not in- 

 jured by the latter. The olives are never ma- 

 nured unless the ground under is cultivated, and 

 then they of course receive a share of the ad- 

 vantage which is intended for the corn. 



Having been lold by the merchant to whom I 

 brouixht a letter of introduction that a Spanish no- 

 bleman, the Marquis del Arco Hermoso, had in- 

 troduced the Florence modeof preparincroil, which 

 lie had learned during a residence in Tuscany, J 

 determined on visiting his plantation, which lay 

 beyond the town of jilcala, about four leagues 

 from Seville. On this excursion I was accompa- 

 nied by Don Francisco Dias, a Spanish gentle- 

 man, who spoke French, and to Vi^'hom 1 had 

 brought an introduction from Mr. Gordon, of 

 Xeres. We expected to find the Marquis, who 

 was a particular friend of Don Francisco's, at hie 

 plantation. 



The town of Alcala, perhaps from its excellent 

 situation for water mills, ie almost wholly inhabit- 

 ed by bakers, who send their bread to Seville. At 

 almost every door we saw the women sitting 

 picking from the wheat the small slones, and 

 other impuri'.ies, which it collects from llieir rude 

 mode of thrashing. 



The marquis had left his country house about an 

 hour before our arrival, but we Ibund a very intel- 

 ligent peasant, who had the management of it in 

 his absence, and who answered my quesiion.-j with 

 irr?at readiness and intelliirence. 1'heie h re 200 

 aranzadas under olives, which have this year suf- 

 lered much from the rain. When rain falls in 

 Auaust, as was the case this year, the olives al- 

 ways suffer from if. He estimates the present 

 crop at about 2,000 fanegas of olives, which will 

 yield about 1,500 arrobas of oil ; but in a very fis- 

 vorable year the plantation will yif^id 5.000 Jijne- 

 gas of olives, or about 3,750 arrol)as of oil. All 

 the ground we saw was a very light sandy loam. 

 It is ploughed once a year. They plough an aran- 

 ^ada of the olive ground in a day, but not more 



than half that quantity of the meadow or corr* 

 land below. There are five kinds of olives on the 

 estate : one of them, the La Reyna, is of a very 

 large size, and is pickled lor eating. The tree of 

 this variety produces but little fruit, and the fruit 

 when pressed yields but little oil, but it is very 

 highly prized for eating, being as large us a good 

 sized plum. 



The mill for grinding, or crushing the olives, 

 consisted of a large circular stone, slopintr inwards 

 to the centre, where a sufficient space was left level 

 tor a millstone of seven leei in diameter, and 14 

 inches in thickness, to turn upon its edije. An 

 upright beam, fixed to the centre of the millstone, 

 and turnmg on a pivot, gave it motion. After 

 having been brought home, the olives lie in a 

 heap, on an average about fifteen days belbre they 

 are crushed. After having been crushed, they are 

 put into the press, and it is the common practice 

 to pour hot water upon them, in order to extract 

 the oil. They are pressed thrice, and each lime 

 with the addition of boiling water, there being a 

 large boiler built into a furnace to supply the wa- 

 ter. The fluid runs from the press to a cistern, 

 and when it is filled, the oil flows over the top, 

 leaving the water below, which is cleared away, 

 as necessary. The peasant said, that all the dif- 

 lerence between the fine and common oil was, that 

 the Ibrmer was the virgin juice, drawn off with 

 cold water, and not mixed with the second and 

 third pressings. The press in this cellar was of 

 the same construction as those at the convent ; it 

 was 20 paces in length, 14 ol which were on the 

 long arm of the beam, and 6 at the short or press 

 end. It must, from its thickness, contain many 

 tons of timber. The oil is kepi in large jars, some 

 of which were built into a projecting part of the 

 wall, and were suffirienlly capacious to contain 

 100 gallons each. The fine oil produced by the 

 Marquis is not relished by his countrymen; they 

 say it has no taste, and prefer the rancid od which 

 they have been accustomed to use. 



The trees on this properly are reckoned very 

 young for olives, although tfiey are sixty years old. 

 They are pruned every year. A man will prune 

 half an ara?jza(/o in a day. But olive trees are 

 said not to require pruninij at all, till they are 25 

 or 30 years old. Two hundred aranzadas are 

 equal to 191 English acres, and 3,000 arrobas of 

 oil, the average annual produce, are equal to 

 12,735 English gallons, old measure, about 63| 

 gallons per English acre. 



1 do not know, however, whether there was 

 not included in this estimate 40 aranzadas that are 

 entirely planted with the jLa jReyna, which are 

 never pressed for oil. Even with iliis deduction 

 the produce would fall very far short of what the 

 trees of the Hieronomiles were said to produce ; 

 namely, from three to four fanegas of olives each 

 tree, each iiinega yielding an arroba of oil. An 

 English acre will contain GO trees, 27 feet apart, 

 which is about the distance they were placed li-om 

 each oiher on the Marquis's plantations; and, 

 indeed, 60 was said f)y the peasant to be the num- 

 ber on each aranzada. One hundred and fifty- 

 three acres, bearing 60 trees each, will contain 

 9,180 trees, and the produce beiuir 3,000 arroba^s, 

 it is scarcely one third of an arroba for each tree. 

 This comes nearer to Don Jacoho Gordon's 

 statement, that from 1^ to 1^ arroba is reckoned a 

 good return from each tree. The trees of the 



