120 COFFEE. 



dred fold has been firequently harvested. Eice yields as much as 

 a thousand fold, and the cotton fields are unusually productive. 

 These facts are interesting to the reader as showing that nature 

 has done more for the coffee-fields of Brazil than for almost any 

 other section of the coffee-growing belt. 



The question of labor has for some time interested the planters 

 of Brazil, and the problem they must solve is how to secure an 

 abundance, for if crops increase without an addition to the popu- 

 lation, there will be a scarcity. Already the wisdom of intro- 

 ducing Chinese laborers has been canvassed. 



It is now a difficult matter to harvest properly a crop of over 

 four million bags of coffee, in addition to giving proper care to 

 other crops. A report recently published in Brazil states that 

 " the only remedy is to curtail plantations to a point where pro- 

 duction may about balance consumption, thus admitting easy har- 

 vesting and better preparation for market." 



The population of Brazil is not definitely known, but it prob- 

 ably does not exceed 12,000,000 souls, including native tribes of 

 Indians numbering about 2,000,000, and in 1876, 1,476,567 slaves. 

 In a few years slavery will be abolished. By. virtue of a decree of 

 the empii-e, made in 1871, all persons born thereafter in Brazil 

 were free, and freedom was given to the slaves employed in the 

 public service or in the imperial household. 



A correspondent of the London Times, in commenting upon 

 the policy of gradual emancipation and certain evasions of the law, 

 says : " The mere fact that the majority of colored freedmen have 

 flocked to the cities and looked for domestic service may be taken 

 as an earnest of what will become of sugar, cotton, and other plan- 

 tations when the whole slave race has ceased to exist. It is sup- 

 posed, indeed, that coffee may thrive in the hands of white laborers ; 

 but at the estate of Bio Bonito, where slave-labor is carried on 

 with equal regard to economy and humanity, there is a firm con- 

 viction that the full enforcement of the law of 1871 must be a 

 death-blow to their industry. And again, other planters, aware 

 that the days of slavery are numbered, work their land to litter 

 exhaustion, anxious to get as much profit out of it as they can 

 with their slaves, and convinced that with final abolition their 

 property will have to be abandoned as valueless." "When a 



