COFFEE. 



65 



duction. The direct imports into the United Kingdom from the 

 States there in the last four years have been as follows, in cwts. : 



Year. 



Central America. 



New Granada. 



Venezuela. 



Brazil. 



1872 



1873 



1874 



133,290 

 197,720 

 151,538 

 210,979 



27,063 

 16,866 

 21,724 

 14,646 



10 ,'685 

 7,863 

 2,162 



159,194 

 143,749 

 200,125 

 222,375 



From British Honduras we have received in the past four years 

 increasing supplies of coffee, but whether this is all grown there, 

 or partly Guatemala produce shipped from thence, I am unable to 

 state, as I have no information about coffee culture in that colony. 

 The direct imports from Honduras have been : 



Cwts. 



1872 2,635 



1873 1,626 



Cwts. 



1874 3,975 



1875 4,777 



Costa Mica. — This republic has risen by the culture of coffee to a 

 degree of prosperity unknown by the other Central American States. ..^ ; 



The introduction of the plant in the vast plain of San Jose, which it (Xy»\^'"^''' 

 now covers, only dates back some thirty years. The principal a ^mAM 



plantations iDclong to the families of MeetdFeargre and M^a. --^---■'^■^ -Q^^J^ 



About 1845, the distinguished Senor Mora, then President of the / 

 Eepublic of Costa Eica, prohibited the raising of plantains for sani- 

 tary and other reasons, and caused a governmental decree to be 

 passed encouraging the culture of coffee. "With lingering steps 

 and slow " the hill-sides about Cartage and San Jose were cleared and 

 planted with coffee slips, and to-day a thousand coffee planters are 

 enjoying a competency from the net income of the estates thus com- 

 pulsorily established. The export of coffee for this year (1876) at 

 Punta Arenas, on the Pacific, I am assured, will fall little short 

 of 18,000,000 lbs. 



The coffee plant is a native of this continent, and an impression 

 which some have that it is inferior to the eastern, as, for example, 

 the Java and far-famed Mocha, is erroneous. On the contrary, the 

 coffee raised on the highlands of Nicaragua and Costa Eica is unsur- 

 passed for strength and a delicate aromatic flavour, unknown to the 

 best coffee of the East ; and the fruit of the lowlands and medium 

 elevations is far from inferior. I have seen specimens of coffee 

 from the haciendas of Padre Vejil and Don Pampilio Lacayo, grown 

 upon the plains in the neighbourhood of Granada. Although not 

 having the plump form or peculiar bluish tinge which are the 

 characteristics of the excellent coffee of the highlands, it compares 

 favourably with the coffee of Java or the Moluccas. The cultivation 

 of coffee will undoubtedly here engage the attention of many of the 

 first colonists. It is worth noting that in opposite quarters of the 

 globe, Costa Eica and South India lie in the same position of north 

 latitude, and that their respective growths approach one another in 



