26 CACAO OR COCOA. 



less than 12 by 12; however, to give the present mode the full benefit ot the 

 return, I will adopt, for comparison's sake, the maximum number <>!' trees ; so 

 that !M50 trees per quarree, at 1} Ib. per tree, Drives 1,211 Ibs. of caeao, at 5 dol- 

 lars per 100 Ibs. is worth GO dollars,* gross return per quarree; deducting 3G 

 dollars, not 80 dollars, for expenses, which leaves 2-1 dollars per quarree net, or 

 about 7 dollars 75 cents per acre. 



This is a startling account from lands among the most fertile in the world, 

 and In MII a plant, under fair treatment, next to the sugar cane, perhaps the most 

 grateful for the care bestowed, more especially when we consider that more 

 than ten times that quantity might be obtained with a comparatively insignifi- 

 cant outlay of money. 



If such, then, be the case, as stated in the above report (and it is to be re- 

 gretted that it is too near the truth), apathy on the part of those whose interests 

 tire so much concerned is unwarrantable. It is not enough to say that ojir 

 fathers must have known the proper way to plant cacao ; this is but a lame ex- 

 cuse, and not sufficient to dispense with any exertions of the present generation, 

 beyond merely collecting whatever fruit may come, as it were, fortuitously. 

 Moreover, at the time the present cacao plantations were established in this 

 island, its cultivation was comparatively little known ; it is therefore likely that 

 they might have erred, as they undoubtedly did, in cramming them so close 

 together ; but notwithstanding this, by a proper system of thinning, the evils 

 might have been easily obviated, and large crops ensured. 



A few mornings ago, a cacao planter from Santa Cruz called on me, and in 

 conversation stated that the only place where he had anything like a crop of 

 cacao at present, was where the hurricane of the 1 1th of October had devastated 

 his estate most severely, and which he at that time considered a ruinous visita- 

 tion. I hope the lesson will not be lost on him. 



In Jamaica it is found necessary to prune the coffee trees yearly, which is 

 done with as much care as gooseberry or currant bushes in England; but, notwith- 

 standing this, I remember a friend of mine in Jamaica telling me of the extraor- 

 dinary difference on his coffee plantation under the management of a person who 

 understood and attended more particularly to the pruning of his trees. 



Lunan, in his ' Hortus Jamaicensis,' published in 1814, gives a very elaborate 

 aiticle on the cacao, although its cultivation was almost extinct in his day in 

 that island. He, however, appears to have derived his information chiefly from 

 Blume, who wrote a short account of Jamaica, in 1672, at which time cacao 

 was the chief export of the island. Lunan attributes its downfall to heavy 

 ministerial exaction, which was then, he says, upwards of 480 per cent, on its 

 marketable value. Speaking of the average weight of cacao per tree, he has the 

 following : ' The produce of one tree is generally estimated at about 20 Ibs. of 

 nuts. The produce per acre in Jamaica has been rated at 1,000 Ibs. weight per 

 annum, allowing for bad years. In poor soils, and under bad management, the 

 produce of the tree rarely exceeds 8 Ibs. weight.' He also says ' When the 

 cacao plants are six months old, the planter from this period must not be too 

 fond of cleaning the plantation from grass and herbage, because they keep the 

 ground cool ; but all creeping, climbing plants, and such weeds as grow high 

 enough to overtop the cacao, should be destroyed.' He gives the distance from 

 tree to tree at 18 feet. I have long since been of opinion that it is of less con- 

 sequence to clean the ground beneath the trees than to attend to the top-pruning 

 of the shade trees, as well as to the cacao (although the former is very desirable, 

 it i* nevertheless a subordinate consideration). Under the present mode of cul- 

 tivation the ground-cleaning is the only one at all attended to, and that badly. 



A very important economy might also be made in the curing of the cacao, by 

 which much time would be saved, and consequently expense, by adopting the 

 name method as is used in Jamaica for drying cotl'.-e, namely, floonogl of cement, 

 ley an- called, barbecues. At convenient distances in the centre of tin M' 

 floorings (which are inclined planes) a sli-htK -rais. 1 circular rid-v is formed 

 Minit, Icavin- an aperture at the lowcr'side to allow the BSOape of any 

 that nny lia\r lodged in them. The cacao is easily brought together in 



:<. lOasai -\ I" include. 



