The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom by P. L. Simmonds

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The ground having been turned up, should be left exposed for some days
to throw off the vapor arising from it; and must then be again
ploughed and cleared with the rake. After waiting for some days, it
should be ploughed for the fourth and last time, and made as clean and
friable as possible. In small plantations this is to be done with the
spade, but on large estates the roller must be used. This roller
consists of a heavy piece of round wood, eight or ten feet long, to
which a pole is fastened in the middle to have oxen harnessed to it.
It is drawn slowly over the ploughed land, and presses the clods to
earth. To give it greater force, the driver sits or stands upon it.

Before the field has been properly ploughed and rolled in the above
way, the middle of October will have arrived, and we then begin to
open a path through the plantation from the highest to the lowest
point, about two roods broad, and the whole of the land is then
divided into separate parcels. Portioning off the estates into
divisions of equal size is a system to be much recommended. By this
means labor may be equally divided, superintended and inspected. Order
and regularity, which are necessary in all things, are most especially
required in cultivation on a large scale.

The size of these parcels is regulated by the nature of the estate. On
flat or gently declining land they may be greater than on steep
grounds, because, in order to prevent the washing away of the soil on
precipitous land, the water must be led off by trenches, which of
themselves make the divisions of land smaller. On flat ground the
divisions may be each 625 square roods, each of which may contain, if
planted--

Trees.
12 feet by 12 625
10 " 10 900
8 " 8 1406
6 " 6 2500

The distance between the coffee bushes cannot be definitely laid down,
as it depends on the nature of the soil. On the most fertile forest
lands twelve feet by twelve is a good distance. Only on low and meagre
grounds, where the tree grows less luxuriantly and strong, can six
feet by six be reckoned a proper distance.

Between the divisions a path should be left, one rood in breadth.
Along the middle paths and by the side of the divisions drains must be
cut, the former two feet in breath and depth, the latter one foot. The
drains along the divisions must be cut in such a way as to conduct the
rain-water to the larger drains which flank the middle paths. On
precipitous ground, when the coffee is planted, small ridges should be
raised between the rows, to prevent the rich earth from washing down
in the heavy rains. The steeper the land is, the closer these ridges
should be; and care should be taken to incline them, so as to break
the descent, the direction of which they should in some degree follow.
The first ridges may be made with the branches of the trees which have
been felled, or with the rubbish cleared from the ground on the first
raking of it.

_Placing the pickets._--When the ground has been worked and divided in
the above manner, the pickets are placed. These are slips of bamboo
one-and-a-half to two feet long. First--two long canes (which do not
stretch like string), each one hundred feet long, are marked off in
feet according to the distance at which the planting is to take place;
heavy stakes are made fast to each end of them, by which they can be
well secured on the ground. At the places where they are marked off in
feet, strings are fastened so tightly that they cannot be displaced;
and then the canes are laid down and well fixed in the ground, one in
the length and the other in the breadth.

Picketing does not give much trouble; it ensures regular planting, and
makes the daily inspection simple. The planting thus takes place in
straight lines, which give an ornamental appearance, and afterwards
renders the view over the whole plantation easy. At every place where
a string has been tied, a picket is stuck in the ground; then the cane
is removed to another place, and so on till all the estate is marked
out by pickets. After the picketing, a hole is made with the spade at
every mark; it should be a good foot broad and deep, and the earth
inside should be made very fine and clear. The earth is now ready to
receive the coffee plant, and the time has only to be waited for when
the first rains fully begin.

_Nurseries_.--In the month of October, or earlier, if coffee trees are
near at hand, nurseries must be prepared in the neighbourhood of the
land about to be planted. This can be done in the ravines, or, if they
are too far from the spot where the plants are wanted, pieces of
ground most convenient can be selected. If the ravines are preferred,
places must be chosen which are shaded by trees not prejudicial to the
coffee plants. On ground where there is no trees, the nurseries may be
covered, at the height of four feet, with leaves of jack (_Artocarpus
integrifolia_), areca, or other palm trees, in a manner to admit the
air.

The ground made loose and fine, coffee plants newly opening, or seeds
only, are planted or sown at a distance of four inches square; 500
square roods will in this way furnish 648,000 plants, which are
sufficient for an estate of 300,000 trees. Transplanting from
nurseries is absolutely necessary in coffee cultivation, and the
trouble it costs is always doubly repaid. Having a choice of plants, a
person can be convinced he has taken none but healthy trees, and he
proceeds therefore with a confidence of success. After the first year,
all failures having been nearly replaced, the estate is fully planted,
the trees are of regular growth, and no useless clearing is
required--a thing which is always necessary in irregular plantations.
It is easy also to pick the berries from the trees which are planted
with regularity; the work goes on smoothly; and, when the estate has
lived its time, it may be abandoned altogether, without leaving
patches of living trees here and there, which renders superintendence
so very difficult.

There should always be a plentiful supply of plants, to give an ample
choice and to make up for failures. When plants are placed in the
nurseries, they should not have more than two offshoots, or leaves,
above each other; and when the ball plants are transplanted, they
should not be higher than a foot, as large plants always give meagre
trees.

At the end of November or beginning of December, if the nurseries are
kept free from weeds, and, if necessary, occasionally watered, the
plants will be about a foot high, and will have put forth 4 or 5
leaves; they are then just fit to be transplanted. Then, the ground is
cloven with the spade, at a distance of an inch and a half round the
stem of the plant, to about three inches deep; the plant, with the
ball of earth adhering to it, is carefully lifted out of the ground,
and the ball is wrapped in a jack, plantain, or other leaf, and tied
to prevent the earth falling off; but, before the plants are thus
taken from the ground, it must be moistened to make the earth
adhesive.

_Planting the coffee trees_.--The plants, which, after the above
operation are called "ball plants," are then placed in a bamboo wicker
frame, and are carefully carried by two men to the place where they
are to be put into the ground. They are then taken out of the frame
and placed in the holes next to the pickets. The pickets are removed,
and the plant is fixed upright; the leaf surrounding the ball is made
loose, but not taken away; the planter presses the plant down with his
hand and fills up the hole with fine loose earth, and the business of
planting the coffee tree is finished.

_Planting the Dadap tree_.--This is a species of Erythrina, probably
_E. indica_, or _E. arborescens_; that used for the purpose in the
West Indies is _E. Corallodendrum_. In Java, as soon as the coffee is
planted, the operation of planting the dadap tree is commenced. The
best sort of dadap comes from Serp or Mienyak; it is smooth and
broad-leaved, and shoots up quickly. Thick young stems are chosen,
about three feet long, and the lower part is pointed off. If the dadap
is moist or juicy, it should be cut twenty-four hours before it is
planted. The dadap is planted uniformly by measuring the cane in the
same way as the coffee itself. Between every two rows of coffee one of
dadap is planted, not on a line with the coffee plants, but
alternately with them; thus, if the coffee is eight feet by eight, the
dadap is sixteen by sixteen. The dadap is planted to the depth of a
foot, with somewhat of a westerly inclination, in order that the
morning sun may fall on a larger surface of the stick. The ground must
be stiffly trodden round the bottom of the stem, and the upper part of
it should have some kind of leaf tightly bound around it to prevent
the sap from escaping. When the coffee and dadap plants have thus been
put out, every fifth day the young plantation should be carefully
inspected, and a picket placed wherever there is a failure, as a mark
to the planter that a new plant is there required. This operation of
replacing failures is carried on all through the wet season, and the
dadaps which have not succeeded are at the same time changed.

_Keeping up the estate_.--In the first six months after planting, the
estate should be cleaned each fortnight with the hoe; the ground being
well moved and the weeds taken out. Those weeds which are too close to
the plants to be removed in this manner, must be pulled out with the
hand. When the plantation is thus wholly or partially cleaned, the
earth must be taken off the weeds, and they must be collected and
thrown on the pathways.

The weeding in this manner gives at first a great deal of trouble, but
it is most advantageous in the long run, as the weeds are thus easily
kept down.

Great care must be taken to do away with an old custom of burying the
weeds in large holes on the estates. It conduces to bad and slovenly
habits, such as cutting off the tops of the weeds by wholesale, and
thus giving the plantation an appearance of cleanliness, whilst it, in
fact, is as dirty as ever. This is soon discovered by the weeds
showing themselves again above ground in a very few days, and even if
they rot under ground, they breed insects which are very hurtful to
the bushes, and the seeds vegetate.

After the first six months, this weeding will be sufficient if it
takes places once a month, but this must be persevered in till the
third year, when there may be a much greater interval between the
weeding. When the trees are coming to full growth, the hoe should be
less frequently used in cleaning; the hand must be used to the full
extent to which the branches reach, as the roots of the tree spread to
a like distance, and if they are injured the growth of the tree is
prejudiced.

The well-being of an estate chiefly depends on frequent cleaning of
the plantation in the beginning. The idea of some persons that
cleaning in the dry season is of little consequence, must be given up,
as it is principally at that very time that it is extremely profitable
to remove and clear the ground round the trees in their growth. In the
first place, this destroys the weeds which take the nourishment away
from the trees; secondly, the ground is rendered more open to receive
the slight showers and dews which moisten it, and to benefit by the
influence of the air; the roots are thus considerably refreshed. The
dew falling on ground which has been recently moved, penetrates at
once into it, and does good to the plant; but if it falls on the
weeds, the first rays of the sun absorb it, and deprive the tree of
this source of refreshment.

The dadap is to be taken care of whilst clearing goes on; it must be
cropped so as to cause it to grow upright, and to throw as much shade
as possible on the coffee without pressing upon it.

In warm fertile ground, where the coffee plant grows rapidly, the
trees should be topped in the third year; but this should be done
sparingly, and as a general measure it is not to be recommended; it
should be resorted to only as a means to prevent the too rapid growth
of the tree, or its running up to a point. Topping and taking off
suckers are both necessary on meagre soils, where the trees run much
to wood; and it prevents the trees being injured in the picking
season, which often occurs without this precaution. The top or middle
stem is broken off at a height of six or seven feet, but care must be
taken not to tear the tree; when the top shoots out again it must be
cropped a second time, and it is seldom necessary to do this more than
twice. The cropping causes the tree to shoot out in breadth, and to
push forth a greater number of sprigs, and good strong ones.

_Picking coffee_.--When the estate becomes productive, it must in the
picking season, just before the work begins, be kept exceedingly clear
of weeds, and be even swept clean with brooms, in order that the
berries which fall off may be gathered up.

The picking should take place under proper superintendence, the trees
be picked row by row, and care taken that each berry is plucked off
separately, and not a heap together, by which the trees are torn and
the first offshoots prevented. In picking high trees, light ladders
should be used, made out of two or three bamboos tied together.

_Customary preparation of the berry in the pulp_.--When the coffee is
picked and brought into the village, it is piled up in a heap in the
open air, and left in that manner for twenty-four hours. Thus heaped
up it gets warm, and this creates a certain fermentation of the juice
which is in the berry. That fermentation promotes the drying and
loosens the silvery pellicle which is attached to the bean inside the
parchment, and which cannot be entirely got rid of in any other way.
Coffee which still retains that pellicle is called in trade "grey
coffee," and is lower priced than good clean sorts. After the
fermentation, the coffee is spread out in rather thick layers, and
turned over twice a day. If it rains during this first spreading out,
the coffee does not require to be sheltered, as the washing causes the
juicy substance to evaporate, and this accelerates the drying
afterwards.

In proportion as the coffee becomes dryer, the thickness of the layer
must be reduced, and the turning over must be more frequent till the
coffee is quite dry outside and the pulp has become hard.

Then the coffee is laid out on drying floors, which can be easily and
speedily covered in rainy or damp weather, and is dried by the
powerful heat of the sun.

This system of drying in the pulp requires six weeks or two months, as
it is advisable not to be over hasty with drying.

When the coffee is entirely dry, it is either at once pounded or
placed in the stores to await that operation. In order to know if the
coffee be sufficiently dry, take a handful of it and shut your hand
close; shake it to your ear, and listen if the beans rattle freely in
the pulp. Or try them by biting the berry, and see if the bean and
pulp are both brittle and crisp, which shows that the fruit is dry
enough.

_Preparation of the coffee in the parchment, or the West India
system_.--Only sound and fully ripe beans can be prepared in the West
India manner. In picking, therefore, all unripe, green, or unsound
beans must be taken away to dry in the pulp. As soon as the coffee is
brought in, it must be pulped. This operation is performed by means of
small peeling mills. These mills consist of two horizontal wooden
cylinders rubbing on a plank; they are covered with hoop-iron, and set
in motion by a water-wheel. The coffee is driven under the cylinder,
and kept constantly moist; by being turned through the mill, the pulp
is so bruised that the bean in the parchment falls from it into the
bamboo open frame, which is placed in front of the mill. The coffee is
then pressed with the hand, and falls through the frame into a basket.
The pulp, and beans not rid of the pulp, remain on the frame; the
first is cleared away, the rest passes a second time into the mill,
and this operation is continued till all the coffee is stripped of
the pulp, and the parchment beans are in the basket. When the
parchment coffee is thus separated from the outer skin, it is thrown
into the washing troughs, and remains there for twenty-four hours;
this drains from it the slimy substance adhering to it. After being
thus steeped, it is washed with pure water two or three times in the
basket, so that it becomes quite free from slimy matter. The parchment
coffee is then spread out on drying frames, and exposed for six or
eight days to the heat of the sun, till the outside is perfectly dry.
To do this equally it must be stirred about every hour. These frames,
which serve also to dry the coffee in the pulp, are made as
follows:--A bamboo roof is set up, resting on four wooden pillars, and
sloping considerably; it is covered closely with reeds; its length is
ten feet, its breadth six feet; the pillars are from nine to ten feet
high; a wooden framework is attached to this, about thirty feet long,
or three times the length of the space covered by the roof. On this
frame are brought out three platforms, one above the other, which are
pushed out by means of little rollers under them; they are ten feet
long by six broad, and six inches deep. The borders are of wood, and
the bottom of platted bamboo. In rainy weather, or when the drying
cannot go on, the three platforms are pushed under the covered space.
These drying places are set up near the overseer's dwelling, where
they stand free, and are not shaded by trees or buildings. After this
first drying on platforms, the parchment coffee is again dried inside
the house, and bamboo huts are for this purpose erected on each side
of the outhouse of the planters. These huts have trays, divided into
two or three compartments, one above the other, to keep the coffee
separate, according to the time of its having been picked. The
parchment coffee is spread out as thin as possible, and turned over
with a small wooden rake every hour. In proportion to the dryness of
the weather, from one to two months are required to dry the coffee
fully. In drying inside the houses, the greatest care must be taken to
prevent heating the coffee; this is the great object of the West
Indian system, as such heating is very prejudicial. On this account
the huts in which the platforms are placed must be very airy, so that
the wind may have good play among the trays, on which the coffee must
be thinly spread and frequently turned.

_Pounding_.--Coffee in the pulp, as well as that in the parchment,
must, before being pounded, be exposed for some hours to the sun to
make it crisp and hard; but it must be allowed to cool again before
the pounding begins, or the beans will be liable to be broken.

The pounding is done in small baskets of a conical form, two feet
high, at the top eighteen inches in diameter, and at the bottom one
foot. These baskets are, up to one-third of their height, thickly
woven round with coir, and fastened on the ground between four thick
bamboo poles, and with the bottom half an inch in the ground itself.
The coffee is pounded by small quantities at a time with light, wooden
pestles; the baskets must not be more than half full. When the coffee
is sufficiently pounded, the basket is lifted from between the poles
and the beans are thrown into sieves, on which it is cleaned from
skin, and white, black, or broken beans. According to the West Indian
system, the coffee must now be instantly put in bags, to preserve its
greenish colour, which is very peculiar. If the green coffee is not
instantly sent to the packing stores to be bagged, it must be put up
in a very dry place, and be turned over once every day, to prevent
heating, which damps and discolors the berry.

Coffee is grown to some extent in Celebes--the average crop being from
10,000 to 12,000 piculs of 133 English pounds. The production has
rather fallen off than increased during the last few years. The whole
of the coffee grown must be delivered by the inhabitants to the
government exclusively, at twelve copper florins per picul. It is much
prized in the Netherlands, and maintains a higher price in the market
than the best Java coffee. As the treatment of the product in Java
differs wholly from that which is in vogue in Celebes, and this, in
our eyes, is much inferior, I know not whether the higher price is
ascribable to the name, or to an intrinsic superiority in quality. It
is certain that this cultivation is susceptible of much improvement,
and might be advanced to a much higher condition.

From tables given by M. Spreeuwenberg ("Journal of the Indian
Archipelago," vol. ii. p. 829) of the quantity of coffee delivered
from each district of this island, for the years 1838 to 1842, it
appears that the average annual delivery of coffee was 1,288,118 lbs.

Of the production of Sumatra I have no details, but a very fair
proportion is grown there--about five million pounds.

_Production of America and the West Indies_.--The cultivation of the
coffee plant is largely carried on in South and Central America and
the West India Islands.

Its culture has greatly increased within the last few years in
Venezuela, particularly in the valleys and on the sides of the hills.
The exports from La Guayra, in 1833, were about twelve millions of
pounds, being nearly double the quantity exported in 1830. The price
there is about ten dollars the 100 lbs., which is still too high to
enable it to enter into competition with the produce of Brazil or
Cuba.

The total produce of coffee in Venezuela in 1839 was 254,567 quintals.
The quintal is about 10 lbs. less than the English cwt.

_La Guayra_.--The exports of coffee from this port in 1796, were 283
quintals.

Quintals.
1843 164,066
1844 141,934
1845 134,585
1846 175,346
1847 130,671
1850 179,537

The exports of coffee from La Guayra have been declining within the
past few years; the shipments were but 153,901 quintals in 1851, and
only 124,623 in 1852.

Caracas coffee ranks in our market with good ordinary St. Domingo.

The decline in the produce of coffee in the British West India
possessions has been very great. In 1838, we imported from the West
India Islands and British Guiana 171/2 million pounds of coffee, in 1850
we only received 41/4 million pounds from thence. The shipments from
Jamaica have decreased from about 15 million pounds in 1836, to 4
million pounds in 1850; Berbice and Demerara, from 5 million pounds in
1837, to about 8,000 pounds in 1850.

_Production of coffee in the Brazils_.--Forty-two years ago the annual
crop of coffee in Brazil did not exceed 30,000 bags, and even in 1820
it only reached 100,000 bags. About that time the high price of coffee
in England, superadded to the diminished production in Cuba,
stimulated the Brazilian planters to extend its cultivation, and in
1830 they sent to market 400,000 bags, or 64,090,000 lbs., and in
1847, the enormous quantity of 300,000,000 lbs.

It would seem from the annexed figures that the production of coffee
in Brazil doubled every five years, up to 1840, since when it has
increased eighty per cent. The increase since 1835 has been upwards of
two hundred millions of pounds, and of that increase the United States
have taken one half.

lbs.
1820 15,312,000
1825 29,201,600
1830 62,685,600
1835 100,346,400
1840 170,208,800
1850 303,556,960

The sources from whence the United States derives its supplies of
coffee are shown in the following table:--

Years. Brazil. Cuba. St. Domingo. Java. Total
1835 35,774,876 29,373,675 19,276,290 4,728,890 103,199,577
1840 47,412,756 25,331,888 9,153,524 4,343,254 94,996,095
1845 78,553,616 1,157,794 13,090,359 3,925,716 108,133,369
1850 90,319,511 3,740,803 19,440,985 5,146,961 144,986,895
1851 107,578,257 3,009,084 13,205,766 2,423,968 152,453,617

Coffee, up to 1830, paid a duty in the United States of five cents a
pound. Since 1832 it has been free.

The population of the United States in 1840 was, in round numbers,
seventeen millions; the average consumption of coffee for the three
years ending 1841, 981/2 millions of pounds, which gave a consumption of
53/4 lbs. per head. The average for the three years ending 1850, was 143
millions of pounds, and the population was twenty-three millions,
which gave a consumption of 61/4 lbs. per head. In 1830 the consumption
was only 3 lbs. per head; but the price ruled nearly double what it
was in the three years preceding 1850.

In 1821 the consumption per head, to the inhabitants of the United
States, was 1 lb. 4 oz. In 1830, the proportion had increased to 3
lbs. per head, the foreign price having fallen fifty per cent. The
importation in the year 1831 doubled, in consequence of the reduced
duty; and the consumption per head for the four years ending with
1842, averaged 6 lb. per head, having quadrupled to each inhabitant
since 1821. From 1820 to 1840, the Brazilian product increased 1,100
per cent, or 155 million pounds. In the same time the consumption in
the United States increased 137 million pounds; leaving an increase of
eighteen million pounds of Rio coffee, besides the enhanced products
of all countries, to supply the increased consumption of England and
Europe.