THE CUBA R E \' 1 E W 



27 



ery stock introduced there by those plant- 

 ing out large orange groves. 



The Best Season in Years 



In the following letter, from a New York 

 commission to an Isle of Pines representa- 

 tive, the prediction is confidently made that 

 this spring will see a great demand for 

 Cuban vegetables, ow'ing to the lack of sup- 

 plies from Florida caused by cold weather. 

 The letter follows : 



"Your general crops, as eggplant, pep- 

 pers, tomatoes and okra, ought to do well 

 this season, as I believe it is a high-priced 

 season all the way through on everything. 

 There is hardly any fruit or vegetable 

 which has been sold for the past three 

 months that has not brought high prices. 

 There will be no crop of Florida vegetables 

 to speak of, however, until next spring, 

 and this will give you the field to yourself 

 in this respect, particularly as applying to 

 eggplant and peppers, because the fall crops 

 in the northern part of the state were des- 

 troyed b}' the storm completely, and the 

 east coast crops, which are always later, 

 were also throughout destroyed, and they 

 are totally unable to secure plants with 

 which to replant, and their crop will be a 

 late spring crop, instead of an early one. 

 It is an exceptional opportunity for you 

 people and ought to be embraced, and a 

 special opportunity for you to round up 

 all the vegetables possible and ship them, 

 as it is going to be your best season in 

 years, either past or to come." 



On January 4th, Florida was in the grip 

 of frigid weather, and on the same night 

 the cold wave swept as far south as Miami 

 and the extreme portion of the mainland. 



The thermometer stood at the freezing 

 point at Jacksonville, while in the north- 

 western portion of the state the mercury 

 fell from 12 to 14 degrees below. Great 

 damage to the orange crop is believed to 

 have resulted. 



At Thomasville, Ga., the reports were 

 that considerable damage had been done to 

 vegetable farms. A temperature of 14 de- 

 grees was recorded at Columbus, the cold- 

 est weather in twelve vears. 



Decadence of Famous Tobacco 



"In spite of the 20 per cent reduction 

 in our duties of Cuban cigar products, our 

 cigar imports from the island have rather 

 decreased than increased, showing in their 

 total but an insignificant figure in compar- 

 ison with the total of our cigar consump- 

 tion. That the Cuban cigar factories do 

 not make am- striking headway with their 

 product in our market is not the fault of 

 their enviable skill and unexcelled reputa- 

 tion as manufacturers, but in their mis- 

 fortune on account of the decadence of 



their raw material, the tobacco produced 

 in the Yuelta Abajo," says the United States 

 Tobacco Journal. 



Cuba's unrivaled reputation of pos- 

 sessing the cigar industry par excellence 

 was gained on the strength of the unsur- 

 passed quality and aroma of the tobacco 

 produced in the unique Vuelta Abajo. 

 But since a number of years that famous 

 tobacco district, which was synonymous 

 with the non plus ultra of flavor and 

 taste in tobacco, has met with such un- 

 fortunate reverses, as to make the fastidious 

 smoker almost forget that it was once the 

 unrivaled arbiter in the domain of tobacco. 



It is an industry, it says, whose product 

 is not for the masses, but chiefly and prin- 

 cipally an industry to gratify the tastes 

 and whims of the more refined and wealthy 

 classes. And these classes do not care 

 for cheapness. They want an article out 

 of ordinary run and they are willing to 

 pay for it. So it is not any tariff duty 

 that stands in the way of a more satisfac- 

 tory expansion and greater prosperity of 

 Cuba's cigar industry. The classes, that 

 is, the well-to-do and wealthy people, who 

 smoke an imported Havana cigar, want a 

 cigar of aroma such as the Vuelto Abajo 

 was famous for, want a smoke to tickle 

 the fastidiousness of their cultured palate. 

 That it is not the price which stands in 

 the way is proven by the fact that among 

 the habitues of the better clubs the quarter 

 cigar has now^ been generally discarded in 

 favor of the 3 for $1. And even those 

 do not seem to give satisfaction that the 

 smoker thinks he could claim from a 35c. 

 cigar. 



The remedy lies with the Cuban govern- 

 ment to provide a comprehensive irrigation 

 system for the tobacco districts of Pinar 

 del Rio. And more necessary, perhaps, is 

 the stocking of tobacco farms with cattle, 

 in order to insure the tobacco growers_ a 

 sufficiency of natural manure. Artificial 

 fertilizers may be cheaper and handier to 

 procure, but they do not seem to have 

 proven as yet a stimulus to the production 

 of the quality tobaccos. 



Peanuts and Cotton Seed 



"There is a strong probability of cotton 

 seed oil manufacturers, as a general policy, 

 adjusting their machinery to crushing pea- 

 nuts and extracting their oil, as a substi- 

 tute in whole or in part for using cotton 

 seed, or as a complement or addition to 

 crushing cotton seed, and cotton seed 

 oil men have been industrially distributing 

 among peanut growlers to stimulate pro- 

 duction is almost conclusive proof that the 

 cotton seed oil mill manufacturers have 

 resolved on crushing peanuts as a settled 

 policy," says the Modern Sugar Planter. 



"If this be so," it says further, "there 

 is practically no limit to the demand for 



