Tobacco Press.
The cases may be piled one upon another, but should be kept from the rays of the sun and in a dry room, so that the sweating of the leaf may be sufficient to fit it for use. It is necessary that the season during sweating should be warm, in order to secure a good sweat. It will commence to "warm up" sometime in April or May, and will be ready to sample or uncase about the first of September. After "going through a sweat," the leaf takes on a darker color, and loses the rank flavor which it had before. It is better to let the tobacco dry off before being used or taken from the case. "Baling" is packing tobacco in small bundles or packages containing from one hundred to two hundred pounds, and is the manner of putting up tobacco for export in Cuba, Paraguay, Algiers, Hungary, Mexico, Syria, the Philippines, China, Sumatra, Japan, Java, Turkey, and in some other tobacco-growing countries. In Cuba after being formed into hands or "gavillos" and four of these tied together with strips of palm-leaf so as to constitute a "manoja," fifty or eighty of them are packed together, making what is called a "tercio" or bale, the average weight of which is two hundred pounds. Hazard says of the number of pounds produced on the vegas:
"A caballeria of thirty-three acres of ground produces about nine thousand pounds of tobacco, made up in about the following proportions: four hundred and fifty of desecho, or best; one thousand eight hundred pounds desechito, or seconds; two thousand two hundred and fifty pounds of libra, or thirds; and four thousand five hundred pounds of injuriado. From these figures, taking the bale at one hundred pounds, and the average price of the tobacco at twenty dollars per bale, (though this is a low estimate, for the crops of some of the vegas are sold as high, sometimes, as four hundred dollars per bale,) an approximate idea may be formed of the profit of a large plantation in a good year, when the crops are satisfactory."
In Mexico, after being baled, the tobacco is sent to the government factories, where it is not weighed until two months afterwards. The price is high, varying from twelve to twenty-eight dollars per crate; and is paid in ten monthly installments. In Persia, when the tobacco is fit for packing, the leaves are carefully spread on each other, and formed into cakes four or five feet round, and three to four inches thick, care being taken not to break or injure the leaves. Bags of strong cloth, thin and open at the sides, are provided, into which the cakes are pressed strongly down on each other. When the bags are filled they are placed in a separate drying house, and are turned every day. Water is then sprinkled on the cakes, if required, to prevent them from breaking. The leaf is valued for being thick, tough, of a uniform light yellow color, and of an agreeable aromatic smell.
In Turkey, the tobacco after remaining in the dwelling-room of the house a sufficient time, is ready for baling. The bales average in weight about forty oques (110 English pounds). The covering of the bales is a sort of netting made by the peasants from goat's hair; it is elastic and of great strength. Vamberry says of packing tobacco in European Turkey:
"The tobacco is packed in small packets (bog tche), and only after it has lain for years in the warehouses of the tobacco merchants, is it honored by the connoisseurs of Stamboul with the title of 'Aala Gobeck.' This sort of finely-cut tobacco resembling the finest silk, is held in equally high estimation in the palaces of the Grand Seignior, in the seraglio, and in the divan of the sublime Porte, where the privy council debate the most important affairs of the empire, under the soothing influence of its aromatic vapors."
In St. Domingo and the United States of Colombia, South America, the bales are called Serous, and in Holland and Germany, Packages. Tobacco is sent to market in bales of various sizes and made of various materials. In Cuba, the tobacco is bound with palm leaves. In South America it is packed in ox hides. From the East it comes in camel's hair sacks or "netting made from goat's hair," while from Persia, tobacco is exported in sacks of strong cloth. Manilla tobacco is shipped in bales containing four hundred pounds net. It is covered first with bass and then with sacking, made of Indian grass tied around with ratan. Each bale contains a printed statement, of which the following is a copy:
PROVINCIA DE CAGAYAN,
PARTIDO DE CITÁ. Cosecha de 186.
Clas de conteine 40 manos de tabaco aforado por la junta de aforo y enfardelado por el que subscribe. Tuguegarao de de 186.