258 



humboldt's cub a. 



writers have often compared the island of Cuba, from 

 the wealth of its productions, with the mines of Guana- 

 juato in Mexico. And in truth, Guanajuato, at the 

 beginning of the nineteenth century, supplied one- 

 fourth part of all the silver from Mexico, and one-sixth 

 of that from all America. Cuba exports at this time 

 (1825), through licit channels, one-fourth of the 

 sugar from all the Antilles, and one-eighth of all the 

 sugar that goes from equinoctial America to Europe 

 and the United States. 



In Cuba there are four qualities of sugar, accord- 

 ing to its purity or degree of purging. Of each loaf, 

 or cone with the base uppermost, the upper part 

 gives white sugar, the middle gives brown, and the 

 lower, or point of the cone gives cucurucho ; these 

 three grades of Cuba sugar are purged, and but a 

 small portion is manufactured as raw, or moscdbado 

 sugar. As the purging forms are of different size, 

 the loaf varies in weight ; it is usually about twenty- 

 five pounds after being purged. The sugar masters 

 desire that each loaf should give f of white, | of 

 brown, and } of cucurucho sugar. 



During my residence in the plain of Guines, I 

 endeavored to gather some exact data relative to 

 the numerical elements of sugar-cane planting. A 

 large sugar plantation producing from 2,000 to 2,500 

 boxes, generally has fifty caballerias of land (about 



