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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



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Photograph by American Photograph Company 



GATHERING THi; MATURE LEAVES IN A CUBAN TOBACCO FIELD 



The most famous tobacco in the world grows in the westernmost province of Cuba — Pinar 

 del Rio. The planter frequently gets as much as five thousand dollars an acre for his crop. 

 In order to keep their product uniform, many manufacturers own their own farms and spend 

 fortunes in fertilizers to keep the soil in the condition requisite to meet the most exacting 

 demands for flavor, texture, and yield. 



the harvest lasts from the first of Decem- 

 ber to the first of October. The fields 

 are so planted in the first place that each 

 month of the grinding season produces 

 its own crop of mature cane. Here is a 

 group of fields where the new crop has 

 just sprouted ; over yonder another group 

 where the cane is half grown ; and on 

 farther is a group where harvesting op- 

 erations are in full swing. 



In harvesting, the cane-cutters first tion 



strip the blades from the stalk ; then they 

 cut off the upper part of the latter, which 

 is worthless except for replanting, since 

 what juice it contains possesses very little 

 sugar. One of the strange things about 

 sugar-cane is that the sap of the growing 

 plant has little sugar, while in the mature 

 stalk the juice is rich in sucrose. The 

 action of the sun's rays seems to trans- 

 form glucose into sucrose — a trans forma- 

 that cannot be accomplished by 



