400 
Cultivation  of  Coffee  in  famaica. 
Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
Aug.,  1892. 
coffee  picked  up  from  the  ground  is  called  "  rat  coffee."  It  costs 
about  double  to  gather  it  as  when  picked  from  the  shrubs. 
The  women  bring  the  berries  to  the  works,  where  they  are  meas- 
ured and  paid  for  by  the  "  Busher,"  as  the  overseer  of  a  coffee  plan- 
tation is  called.  To  prepare  the  coffee  for  market  the  berries  are 
first  run  through  a  machine,  called  the  "  pulper,"  which  tears  off  the 
outer  skins  and  pulp.  A  "  pulper  "  is  simply  a  large  cylindrical 
wheel  about  three  feet  in  diameter  and  two  feet  long,  covered  with 
corrugated  iron,  like  a  nutmeg  grater,  and  arranged  so  that  it  revolves 
so  close  to  another  corrugated  iron  surface  that  the  berries 
cannot  go  through  entire,  but  are  caught  by  the  rough  surfaces  and 
torn  to  pieces,  the  skins  and  pulp  being  carried  through,  the  seed 
dropping  beneath  into  a  tank  of  water.  The  water  serves  to  wash 
the  grains,  and  also  to  separate  the  light  from  the  heavy  coffee ;  the 
former  floating,  are  skimmed  off;  the  latter  sinking,  are  taken  from 
the  tank  after  the  water  is  drawn  away.  Heavy  coffee  is  much  the 
better  grade,  and  it  is  kept  separate  from  the  light  in  all  subsequent 
operations.  At  this  stage  the  coffee  seeds  are  still  enclosed  in  the 
"  parchment  skins,"  which  are  tough  and  cannot  be  separated  from 
the  seeds  when  green  ;  hence  the  next  process  is  to  thoroughly  dry 
the  seed  in  order  to  make  the  "  parchment  skins"  brittle  so  they 
can  be  hulled  off.  For  this  purpose  the  seeds  are  spread  on  "  barbi- 
cues"  similar  to  those  previously  described,  only,  of  course,  on  a 
larger  scale.  The  "  barbicues  "  of  an  ordinary  sized  plantation 
cover  about  an  acre  of  ground,  and  are  usually  built  on.  sloping 
ground  and  terraced.  When  it  threatens  a  shower,  and  every  even- 
ing to  protect  it  from  the  rain  and  dews  (which  are  heavy  in  the 
tropics),  the  coffee  is  raked  into  a  pile  in  the  center  of  each  "  barbi- 
cue  "  and  covered  with  a  wooden  cover-shaped  hopper.  From  ten 
days  to  two  weeks'  exposure  to  the  sun  on  the  "  barbicue  "  will  dry 
the  seeds  so  that  they  can  be  hulled.  The  "huller"  is  a  large  wooden 
wheel,  arranged  to  revolve  like  the  wheel  we  see  in  brickyards,  but 
running  in  a  circular  narrow  trough.  The  coffee  is  placed  in  this 
trough,  and  the  wheel  constantly  running  over  it  breaks  off  the 
brittle  "  parchment  skins,"  being  heavy  enough  for  this  purpose,  but 
not  so  heavy  as  to  crush  the  seeds.  The  coffee  seeds  are  separated 
from  the  broken  "  parchment  skins,"  called  trash  at  this  stage,  by 
being  run  through  a  "  fanner,"  similar  to  the  fans  of  our  threshing 
machines,  which  blows  off  the  trash.     There  still  remain  closely 
