160 THE CULTURE OF TOBACCO. 



the new building. The ddoi-s and windows are made so as to be used 

 as ventilators. 



When the tobacco is thoroughly cured it is roughly graded, tied 

 into bundles or hands of about fifty leaves each, and taken in baskets 

 to the fermentation house. 



The fei'mentation house is substantially built of brick, and I'oofed 

 with the same palm thatch as that used for the curing barns. The 

 building is usually two hundred and forty feet long and sixty-six feet 

 wide. In the centre of the building is a wooden platfoim raised 

 three feet off the floor, and all around the platform is a free space 

 fifteen feet wide on the floor where the coolies sit on mats and assort 

 the tobacco. Both sides of the building are well lighted with glass 

 windows. There is usually a small receiving room at one side of the 

 building where the tobacco is received fi'om the cuiing sheds. 



The fermentation is conducted vei'y much as is the fermentation 

 of the better grades of cigar leaf in America. When the tobacco 

 has been thoroughly fermented, it is carefully graded according to 

 colour, size, texture and condition, and made into bundles of from 

 thirty to forty leaves. These bundles are tied with a portion of the 

 inner bark of a tree. One of the merits of Sumatra tobacco that has 

 helped to give it a reputation is the thoroughness of the grading. A 

 cigar maker knows when he purchases a bale of Sumatra just what 

 there is in it, and what he can get out of it, so that he is willing to 

 give a highei' pritte than for a bale where the contents are unknown or 

 doubtful. 



The tobacco is placed in bales holding one hundred and seventy- 

 six English pounds, and covered with matting. A bale is about two 

 and-a-half feet square and a foot thick. Each bale is then dis- 

 tinctly marked with a description of the contents and the name of the 

 estate, and is then leady for shipment. Nearly all of it first goes to the 

 Amsterdam market, whence it is re-shipped to all portions of the world. 



Some of the companies employ as many as sixteen thousand 

 coolies and a large staff of experts. One company has paid an average 

 dividend of seventy-five per cent, for many years. 



COST OF PRODUCTION, PROFITS, WAQES AND 



YIELDS. 



In round figures the American tobacco growers produce 

 annually six hundred million pounds of tobacco, worth twelve 

 million pounds sterling, or an average of fivepence a pound at first 

 hand. A nice percentage of the twelve million pounds is clear 

 profit. Whether the individual tobacco grower is making a profit or 

 not depends largely on his cjwn ability. Where men are employing 

 their heads in the production of tobacco they are makino- money" 

 and in many instances of exceptionally favoured location they are 

 making money without any great use of brain power. When a 

 locality is found where people say that they are not making money in 

 the cultivation of tobacco and yet continue in its cultivation, 

 something is wrong— either their meth.)ds are faulty or the conditions 

 are not favouiulile. In either case, they show lack of ability, for if 

 the methods are wrong they should discover the fact and' change 

 them, and if the locality and conditions are not favouiabli; they 

 should be producing some other crop than tobacco. 



