252 COFFEE I ITS CULTIVATION AND PROFIT. 



a commissario, or factor, who acts as their agent. 

 It is received in all sorts of lots and conditions from 

 many different growers, no regularity being observed 

 in the style of bag or the amount it contains. The 

 factor sells his stock to the dealers or packers 

 (ensaccadores), men that control large warehouses. 

 Coffee culture extends from the Amazon to the 

 province of San Paulo, and from the coast to the 

 western limits of the empire a surface exceeding 

 653,400 square kilometres. Within this territory it 

 is estimated that there are about 530,000,000 Coffee 

 trees, which cover an area of 1,400,000 acres. 

 The Coffee plantations situated on the high 

 lands, and exposed to the east, are the most pro- 

 ductive, but the industry prospers even in the 

 bottom lands, although the product is said to be 

 inferior in flavour." 



On the high lands the gathering of the crop 

 begins in April or May and continues until Novem- 

 ber. The " West India process" of separating the 

 pulp, and then washing and drying the seeds, 

 prevails on most of the large estates. 



Labour is a difficulty ; many planters are said 

 to have lately worked their estates to shreds, feeling 

 certain that with the extinction of slave labour their 

 chance of profit will be extinct. In fact, the general 

 opinion seems to be, Coffee in Brazil has been 

 overdone. " Recent reports estimate the stock of 

 Coffee in Rio de Janeiro and Santos at no less than 

 815,000 bags an enormous quantity, for which, of 



