Hazard, in his work on Cuba, describes the celebrated vegas or tobacco plantations, of the island as follows:
A Cuban vega.
"The best properties known as vegas, or tobacco farms, are comprised in a narrow area in the south-west part of the island, about twenty-seven leagues broad. Near the western extremity of the Island of Cuba, on the southern coast, is found one of the finest tobaccos in the world. Within a space of seventy-three miles long and eighteen miles wide, grows the plant that stands as eminent among tobacco plants as the lordly Johannisberger among the wines of the Rhine. Shut in on the north by mountains, and south-west by the ocean, Pinar del Rio being the principal point in the district. These vegas are found generally on the margins of rivers, or in low, moist localities, their ordinary size being not more than a coballeria, which amounts to about thirty-three acres of our measurement. The half of this is also most frequently devoted to the raising of the vegetable known as the platano (banana), which may be said to be the bread of the lower classes. A few other small vegetables are raised. The usual buildings upon such places are a dwelling house, a drying-house, a few sheds for cattle, and perhaps a small bohio (hut), or two, made in the rudest manner, for the shelter of the hands, who, upon some of the very largest places number twenty or thirty, though not always negroes—for this portion of the labor of the island seems to be performed by the lower classes of whites. Some of the places that are large have a mayoral, as he is called, a man whose business it is to look after the negroes, and direct the agricultural labors; but, as a general thing, the planter, who is not always the owner of the property, but simply the lessee, lives upon, directs, and governs the place.
"Guided by the results of a long experience transmitted from his ancestors (says a Spanish author), the farmer knows, without being able to explain himself, the means of augmenting or diminishing the strength or the mildness of the tobacco. His right hand, as if guided by an instinct, foresees what buds it is necessary to take off in order to put a limit to the increase or height, and what amount of trimming is necessary to give a chance to the proper quantity of leaves. But the principal care, and that which occupies him in his waking hours, is the extermination of the voracious insects that persecute the plant. One called cachaga domesticates itself at the foot of the leaves; the verde, on the under side of the leaves; the rosquilla, in the heart of the plant; all of them doing more or less damage. The planter passes entire nights, provided with lights, clearing the buds just opening, of these destructive insects. He has even to carry on a war with still worse enemies,—the vivijagnas, a species of large, native ants, that are to the tobacco what the locust is to the wheat. This plague is so great, at times, that prayers and special adoration are offered up to San Marcial to intercede against the plague of ants.
"The plant, whose original name was cohiba, seems to have been cultivated first by Europeans on the island in the vicinity of Havana. The island of Cuba is without doubt well adapted for the cultivation of tobacco—the soil, climate, and improved methods of culture all tend to the production of a leaf tobacco as celebrated as it is valuable.
Killing Bugs by Night.