1 62 The Fermentation of Cacao 



no planter could afford to deal with large and 

 very large quantities of cacao in this manner. 



The merchant should have several different 

 sweating boxes to suit the different degrees 

 of dryness in the cacao purchased, and to him 

 may be recommended, even more than to the 

 planter, the advantages that vacuum drying- 

 holds in requiring a minimum of fuel, economy 

 of time (cacao coming from the sweating boxes 

 in the early morning can be bagged and 

 shipped by midday), theft and wastage reduced 

 to a minimum, as all operations are finished 

 within four walls in a few hours. At a glance 

 it is obvious that the merchant can consider- 

 ably reduce the capital employed on " cacao 

 account " by owning a vacuum dryer ; also, 

 he can reduce his risk of the market going' 

 against him by two or three weeks. In fact, 

 it would revolutionize the business ; profit and 

 loss on this account could be estimated at any 

 moment, and revision of buying prices made 

 to suit the cabled market reports. A machine- 

 driven cacao polisher should also be included 

 in the equipment ; it effects within half an hour, 

 at a cost of a penny or two, the value of a day's 

 work for two men, and should certainly increase 

 the value of a merchant's cacao by is. to 2s. 

 per cwt. It is time, therefore, that the cacao 

 merchants abandoned primitive methods and 

 came abreast of the times by adopting one 

 or other of the various time, labour and money- 

 saving appliances now on the market. 



