220 



TROPICAL AGRICULTURE 



CHAP. X 



Tying the 

 hands. 



Packing the 

 tobacco. 



The betan. 



The press. 



prevent over-fermentation. After the heaps have been left 

 for from thirty to forty days, all the heat will be gone, and 

 the leaves will have acquired the qualities of tobacco. Then, 

 in damp weather, the heaps are broken up, and the leaves 

 tied together in bundles of twenty-five or thirty ; these bun- 

 dles are sometimes called " hands." To make a hand pro- 

 perly, an unsound leaf is twisted into the form of a rope and 

 wrapped round the upper part of the bundle, and secured 

 tightly by tucking the end into the middle of the leaves 

 which are gently separated for the purpose. 



The tobacco may now be packed in bales, or boxes, or 

 hogsheads for shipment, considerable pressure being exerted 

 so as to compress the leaves and to exclude as much air as 

 possible. In Cuba and other places, before packing, it is 

 usual to sprinkle the hands lightly with a wash, called betan 

 and afterwards to arrange the hands in heaps, on the fer- 

 menting platform, pressed firmly together, for the space of 

 from four to six days. The betan is made by allowing some 

 of the stalks to remain in water until they become rotten, 

 which will usually be in about a week's time. Sometimes, 

 the leaves are damped slightly with the wash before they are 

 made into hands, and after the damping process they are put 

 back in the press for a few days. The press is the term 

 usually applied to the platform on which the tobacco is 

 bulked and pressed during the fermentation process, and it 

 is as well to have the press arranged in a separate compart- 

 ment of the drying house. 



