CULTIVATION OF COFFEE.

"The method employed in Porto Rico and other points for the growing and multiplication of coffee, by utilizing the plants which spring up from the seed which falls alone or is lost at gathering time, must be superseded by another method more certain, employing seed set apart for the purpose.

"In order to make seed beds, a place is selected with a slightly inclined surface, or at least one which will not become swampy or muddy and which has a good layer of vegetable soil, and it is worked or spaded until the same is well pulverized. It is cleared of all roots, stones, etc., and if the land be not sufficiently fertile it is enriched with common barnyard manure. After this has been done, in the month of February, the sowing takes place, for which purpose coffee grains in the berry or husk are selected which can be seen to have unusual size and weight, and which give signs of being perfectly formed, and they are planted at a depth of 3 centimeters. The grains are planted with the finger, or, as is more convenient, with a stick, and after being placed in the hole are covered with earth, which is pressed down with the hand. The planting should be in rows separated from each other a distance of about 15 centimeters, and the dis ́tance between each planted grain should be the same. In about twenty days the new coffee plants will commence to spring up, and they are allowed to remain for a year or a year and a half, when they will have acquired a height of about 80 centimeters or have three crosses, at which time they may be transplanted to the site determined upon for the coffee grove.

"The care of the seed beds during this time is limited to clearing it of weeds and taking measures to prevent the winds from injuring the tender plants, because if they are seen to turn black or take on a burnt color the center or stock of the little plant will cease to grow. They may be protected from the winds by making palisades or shelters of boards, palm leaves, cane, bamboo, etc.

"When the small plants have acquired the height indicated, the lower and middle branches are cut off, leaving only the cross branches in order that the trunk may grow straight and clean, and its top or branching commence at the height most convenient for the work of gathering the crop.

"Some days after this pruning the trees are taken up from the seed bed, using for this purpose a narrow spade, which is thrust into the earth near the foot of the tree to a depth equal to the length of the roots, and then by gently employing the necessary force, the tree is taken out with all its roots intact, and with a clod of earth which it is necessary to preserve, so that the roots may remain covered and insure a new rooting when transplanted.

COFFEE PLANTATION IN ADJUNTAS, SHOWING GLACIS FOR DRYING.

'When the trees taken up have very long tap roots, say of 20 centimeters, it is well to cut off the lower half with a pair of scissors.

PLANTING.

"The first necessary condition which land intended for a coffee grove must have is that it be protected from the full force of the constant and tempestuous winds; thus ravines, points protected by a mountain or masses of vegetation, those exposed to the south, etc., possess these conditions. The land must also be sloping or high, so that the rains shall never form pools or mud holes.

"The preparation of the land consists in the labors necessary to pulverize the ground, turn the earth over, thoroughly cleaning it of roots, stones, etc., and making the holes which are to receive the young plants.

"The planting or setting out of the plants is done in the following

manner:

"On the land plowed and cleaned equidistant lines are marked out, 2 meters from each other, and along this line, at intervals of 2 meters, holes are dug 45 centimeters long, 45 centimeters wide, and 45 centimeters deep. The superficial earth is placed to the right of the hole, and the lower earth, or subsoil, to the left, the latter being thoroughly mixed with a kilogram of barnyard manure.

"Eight days after the holes have been dug the plant is set out, being brought from the seed bed in baskets, the roots wrapped in bark and banana leaves and covered with damp coffee sacking, and then the laborers proceed to set out the plants. One man takes the plant and places it in the hole, throwing in first the earth on the right-hand side of the hole-that is, that portion of earth taken from the surface, which, being richer, is best to place next to the roots-and then the hole is filled with the remaining fertilized earth, tramping it down in the hole in order to make it firm.

"Three or four months after the first planting it is necessary to replant that is, to set out trees in those holes in which the first plantings did not live-taking care that the new trees have the same size as the others in order that the entire grove may develop and grow evenly.

WORKINGS.

"The coffee groves situated on level lands, or those but slightly inclined and in situations which permit the employment of oxen, ought to be worked with the plow, giving it two plowings a year, the first after the replanting and six months later the second, selecting such times for this operation as will find the soil fresh and moist.

"If, owing to the condition of the ground or on account of its inclination the plow can not be used, the coffee grove must be worked by

hand, and the hoe employed for this purpose should penetrate 30 centimeters into the ground; and as this work is expensive, it is done but once a year, in the month of December.

PRUNING.

"The coffee, like all trees intended to bear fruit, requires pruning. If the excessive, badly calculated pruning which has been practiced in Cuba has been prejudicial, the abandonment of these groves to spontaneous development, to which they have been left in Porto Rico and other points, has also worked injury. If we consider the tree as a machine destined to give fruit and produce forced profits, its growth must be regulated and its organs prepared.

"The coffee tree should be pruned from the time it is 3 years old, counting from the time when the first pruning gave shape to the tree. This operation consists in cutting away during the third year the first crosses above the roots in order to commence the formation of a clean, strong, straight trunk. The fourth year, the fourth and even the fifth cross is removed for the purpose of preparing the final and only cross of the tree, which is to serve for the woody branches and for the formation of the top. During the fifth year the center is cut in order to restrain the longitudinal growth of the tree, and leave the cross at the height of a meter and a half, which is most convenient afterwards when gathering the fruit. If the tree should be allowed to grow taller the gathering would be difficult, and if it should have a lesser height it would reduce the body of the tree and diminish the productive zone. "In addition to the formative prunings which terminate during the fifth or sixth year an annual pruning is necessary, which is intended: 'First. To make the grove render the largest possible amount of fruit; and in order to secure this result it is necessary to cut off the old branches, or those which have exhausted their capacity to bear fruit, in order to give the tree the necessary light and ventilation.

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"Second. To suppress the suckers which absorb the sap and give no fruit; to cut the sprouts from the foot of the tree and also from the trunk and those which grow among the branches in unsuitable places; to suppress crooked and badly placed branches, those that may have been broken by storms, in the gathering of the fruit, or those which may have been broken by the excessive weight of the fruit.

The pruning is done after the harvest has been collected—that is, in the months of December and January-and a saw should be employed for the thick branches, and limbs over an inch and a half in thickness should scarcely ever be cut off. For the slender branches and sprouts, a sharp cutting machete should be used, always making clean cuts close to the limb, covering the wound with some sort of grafting wax.