February i, 1892] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
535 
acres of land for which tha lite husband of the 
former, and father of the latter, paid three 
thousand pounda sterling (or 30,0001000 in Brazilian 
ourrenoy). 
Tha mineiro'B mode of farming was a peculiar 
ona, and uot nt all likely to improve the land or 
make it what we could call first class for coffee 
growing aiterwards. 
His system wag to fell the finest virgin forest, 
clear the laud, by burning the withered branches, 
and plant the clearing with Indian corn, with a fair 
sprinkling of pumpkin seeds. Virgin forest has no 
weeds, and consequently no work was required until 
the corn was ripe; only what was needed for home 
consumption was picked, then a drove of pigs were 
turned into the corn fields to fatten. These porkers 
grow to a good size and put on a large quantity of 
fat. The mode of preparing the pork for the market 
was thus. Afcer the pig was killed a heap of corn 
straw was piled on the top of the carcass, this was 
sot fire to, and the burnt hair, and flakes of outside 
skin came easily off, the pig was then cut in two 
longitudinally, the bones carefully taken out, deep 
outs, throe inches apart, wore made across in the 
inside, the=e ouls were filled with salt. Each halt 
carcass was made into a roil, and put in a 
rough bambu basket, made the size. It was 
then ready for tha market. If the farii»er had 
a troop of mules himself, ha would take these 
baskets with their contsnts loaded on pack saddles 
to sell, sometimes going as far as the capital to 
find a market for this class of goods which got 
the name of toucinho. There was also no want of 
local agents, owners of troops of mules, who would 
buy toucinho at so much an arroba of 15 kilos, 
and send it to the best paying market; 
Many of the more industrious of the farmers 
grow tobaoco: the leaves were half dried, twisted 
like a rope of many strands with a " thraw crook," 
and the rope rolled on a stick. The ends of this 
stick projected, the tolls were put on end, leaning 
against a wall or a fence rail. The black juice 
would ooze out and drain towards the lower end, 
and when this was noticed the roll would be turned 
end for end. This fermenting process was con- 
tinued for some days until the sweating ceased. 
Some farmers had a famous reputation for curing 
tobacco, and tobaoco from soma special districts 
was considered extra fine, and sold at a high price. 
The same system of curing in Minas and S. Paul's 
tobacco still continues. In the consuming of the 
weed the country people out their tobacco from a 
piece of the roll which they carry in their pocket, 
and make cigarettes with fine maize straw, every 
tiruG they smoke. But in towns tobacconists have 
machines for cutting it up like " bird's eye " for sale or 
for makint^ cigarettes. Tbere is a large consumption 
of cigarettes all over South America, made from 
both paper and Indian corn straw. The Brazilian 
prefers the latter. The habit of smoking is common 
both amongst males and females. It is noticeable 
amongst the lower classes that the female always 
emokoH a pipe, with a clay bowl, and a stick for a 
shank. The stick is got from the branch of aparticular 
bush which in place of pith has a small perforation 
down the centre. The males both of the upper 
and lowor classes nearly always smoko cigarettes. 
I have noticed that in soma parts of the littoral 
of the Province of llio do Janeiro the smoker 
carries a bLnvlWi of loaves in his pockets, makes 
his own oinar and smokes it in onu'a prosonce, 
generally olTering at tho same time the cigar to the 
pnrson with whom ho may bo conversing. 
Hniall patches of oauo wore also grown, and the 
product after supplying tho needs o( the family 
was mado jnto briokoltoa, rolled in banana or 
corn loaves, something like your jaggary— but 
called hero rapadara. The cane crushing was done 
with wooden vertical rollers with bullocks, and the 
concentrating of the juice was effected in a large 
copper boiler. Query has the word " sugar " oome 
from "jaggery'' or "jaggery" from "sugar" ? You 
orientals ought to know it the latter word or tha 
Tamil " sakara " — was in use before Vasco da Gama 
made his famous voyage 1* 
The very poor people in these parts use the pure 
juice of the cane instead of water and sugar in 
the preparing of the cheering but not intoxicating 
liquors made from coffee, mate and the oongonha. 
The formerjtwo we were all well acquainted with, but I 
myself did not know of the latter at least by name. It 
was only on my recent visit to Minas that my attention 
was called to it. Oongonha in my opinion is a kind of 
mate. Ilex Paraguaiensis. — There are two kinds of it 
in Minas, one congonha de matto (forest), the other 
congonha de carnpo (patana). The leaves are used 
green as they are taken from the bush. They are 
dried hastily in an oven or at the open fire, then put 
into the tea-pot along with a few small pieces of 
burning charcoal and well shaken together, water is 
then added, and the charcoal skimmed off the top 
of tha liquid which after a few minutes is ready for 
drinking. Its refreshicg effects are similar to those 
of tea or coffee. 
I mentioned before that in these parts the people 
produced the ra,v material which they made into 
cloth for clothing which was not confined entirely 
to cotton ; woolen blankets and sometimes com- 
plete suits, could be seen of good "home spun.'' 
Thus in their simple state livsd tha people in 
the West of the Province of Sao Pa.ulo and South 
of Minas Geraes, What they required from out- 
side their own homes was little. 
But a mighty civilizing agency was at work in 
the east. The calm peaeefulness of these regions 
was doomed to be intruded on, in a few years 
by that giaat of colonial development— a railway. 
A.t the time of G. A. C.'s visit along with the 
writer, 1876, the railway had been opened as far 
as Riobl&rs on the 6' 3" gauge, and to Mogymirim 
on the metre, these two places being the farthest 
west- ward that coli'ee planting extended. As soon 
as it began to be noticed that the Mogyana 
railway was to be a paying one, no time was 
lost in raising capital for its extension. The 
capital was supplied by wealthy capitalists, and 
planters in tho country. 
In answer to this qtiestiou we quote as follows 
from Yule's "Ho :f on Jobsou " : — 
SuGAE, s. This familiar word is of Sanskrit origin. 
Sarkara oriyiiiiUy signifies 'grit or gravel,' thenoe 
crystallized cn^ir, and through a Prakrit; iorm sakJMra 
gave the Persian shakkar, the Greek cciKxap and 
(jctizxapov, and the late Latin saccliarum, Tho Arabic 
is sukkar, or with the article as-sukhar, and it is probable 
that our'moJtM ii form 3, It. Taccchero&nA siicchero,'Fr . siicrc, 
Qortn, Zucker, E";,'. sugar, came, as well as the Span. 
azucar and Port, assucar, from the Arabic direct, and not 
through Latin or Greek.* lu fact the ancient know- 
ledge of the p^oiluct was slight and vague, and it was 
by the Arabs that the oultivition of the sugarcane 
was introduced into Egypt, Sicily, and Andalusia. It 
is po8,^ible indeed, and not improbable, that palm-sugar 
(see jAQGp;aY) ia a much older product than that of 
the oane. The original habitat of the latter is not 
known ; there ia only a slight und doubtful statement of 
Loureiro, who, in epeskiog of Oochin-Chiua, uses the 
words " habitat et culitur " — which may imply its exist- 
enoo in a wild ^tat^^ as well as under cultivation, iu 
that country. D.i UandoUe aasigns its earliest pro- 
duetioij to the country extending from Oochin-Chiua 
ta Bengal. 
* Tho Russian is nakhay ; Polish, :ukier ; Uung., 
:itki'i-. 
