THE CUBA REVIEW 23 
Display Case of Cigars. 
contents, no matter how far distant may be the land where they will finally be 
consumed. 2 
Has the reader ever stopped in front of a cigar stand and carefully examined 
the various sizes, shapes and names of the cigars exposed for sale?. If he has, and has 
done this at intervals, he will have observed a great variety and number of these. 
But he perhaps would be astonished did he know that in our large factories a very 
important department, where everything is most carefully card indexed, is that 
devoted to the records of names used by the various customers of the factory during 
their long period of purchasing. From all over the globe have come requests from 
individuals asking that a certain shape and size of cigar be put up in a package and 
given a certain name. This request has been complied with when investigation in 
the files of the factory shows that that name has not yet been used for any customer. 
Thus it has happened that today thousands upon thousands of names have been given 
to the same cigar, so that a name now means nothing. In the same way the range 
of sizes is limited only by the caprice of the purchaser. In the matter of shapes, 
this is not so much the case, there being certain standards, such as “Coronas,” “Per- 
fectos,” “Bouquets,” “Londres,” ‘‘Brevas,” etc., variations from which have often been 
made, though not with the same bewildering frequency as has been the case with 
names. 
That some of the most popular shapes have been the result of accidents is seen 
