Previous to Emancipation. 1852.
Sugar 300,000,000 lbs. 620,000,000 lbs.
Molasses 125,000,000 " 220,000,000 "
Leaf Tobacco 6,000,000 " 10,000,000 "
Coffee 30,000,000 " 19,000,000 "
The sugar manufactories during that time had also increased from eight hundred to upwards of sixteen hundred. Can any one calmly compare this marvellous progression of Cuba with the equally astounding retrogression of our Antilles, and fail to come to the irresistible conclusion that the prosperity of the one is intimately connected with the distress of the other.
While stating the annual produce of tobacco, I should observe that upwards of 180,000,000 of cigars, and nearly 2,000,000 boxes of cigarettes, were exported in 1852, independent of the tobacco-leaf before mentioned. Professor J.F.W. Johnston, in that curious and able work entitled Chemistry of Common Life, styles tobacco "the first subject in the vegetable kingdom in the power of its service to man,"—some of my lady friends, I fear, will not approve of this opinion,—and he further asserts that 4,500,000,000 lbs. thereof are annually dispersed throughout the earth, which, at twopence the pound, would realize the enormous sum of 37,000,000l.
If smoking may be called the popular enjoyment of the island, billiards and dominoes may be called the popular games, and the lottery the popular excitement. There are generally fifteen ordinary lotteries, and two extraordinary, every year. The ordinary consist of 32,000l. paid, and 24,000l. thereof as prizes. There are 238 prizes, the highest being 600l., and the lowest 40l. The extraordinary consist of 54,400l. paid, of which 40,800l. are drawn as prizes. There are 206 prizes, the highest of which is 20,000l., and the lowest 40l.; from which it will appear, according to Cocker, that the sums drawn annually as prizes are very nearly 150,000l. less than the sums paid. Pretty pickings for Government! As may naturally be supposed, the excitement produced by this constitutional gambling—which has its nearest counterpart in our own Stock Exchange—is quite intense; and as the time for drawing approaches, people may be seen in all the cafés and public places, hawking and auctioning the billets at premium, like so many Barnums with Jenny Lind tickets. One curious feature in the lotteries here is the interest the niggers take in them. To understand this, I must explain to you that the coloured population are composed of various African tribes, and each tribe keeps comparatively separate from the others; they then form a kind of club among their own tribe, for the purpose of purchasing the freedom of some of their enslaved brethren, who, I believe, receive assistance in proportion as they contribute to the funds, and bear such a character as shall interpose no obstacle to their ransom being permitted. A portion of their funds is frequently employed in the purchase of lottery-tickets, and a deep spirit of gambling is the natural consequence; for though the stake entered is dollars, the prize, if won, is freedom. These lotteries date back to 1812; and if they have always been kept up as before explained, they must have contributed something like ten millions sterling to the Government during their forty years' working.
A friend told me of a shameful instance of injustice connected with these lotteries. A poor slave who had saved enough money to buy a ticket, did so; and, drawing a small prize, immediately went off to his master, and presented it to him as a part of his redemption-money. The master having ascertained how he obtained it, explained to him that, as a slave, he could not hold property; he then quietly pocketed it, and sent poor Sambo about his business. What a beautiful commentary this is on the law respecting Coartados, which I inserted a few pages back. I must, however, remark that, from the inquiries I made, and from my own observations of their countenances and amusements, the impression left on my mind is, that the slaves are quite as happy here as in the United States; the only disadvantage that they labour under being, that the sugar harvest and manufacture last much longer in Cuba, and the labour thereof is by far the hardest drain upon the endurance of the slave. The free negroes I consider fully as well off as those in the Southern States, and immeasurably more comfortable than those who are domiciled in the Northern or Free States of the Union. The number of free negroes in Cuba amounts to one-fourth of the whole coloured population, while in the United States it only amounts to one-ninth—proving the great facilities for obtaining freedom which the island offers, or the higher cultivation of the negro, which makes him strive for it more laboriously. I will not attempt to draw any comparison between the scenes of horror with which, doubtless, both parties are chargeable, but which, for obvious reasons, are carefully concealed from the traveller's eye.
Among the curious anomalies of some people, is that of a dislike to be called by the national name, if they have a local one. The islanders feel quite affronted if you call them Españoles; and a native of Old Spain would feel even more affronted if you called him a Cubano or an Havanero. The appellations are as mutually offensive as were in the olden times those of Southron and Scot, although Cuba is eternally making a boast of her loyalty. The manner of a Cuban is as stiff and hidalgoish as that of any old Spaniard; in fact, so far as my short acquaintance with the mother country and the colony enables me to judge, I see little or no difference. Some of them, however, have a dash of fun about them, as the two following little squibs will show.
It appears that a certain Conde de----, who had lately been decorated, was a most notorious rogue; in consequence of which, some wag chalked up on his door in large letters, during the night, the following lines, which, of course, were in everybody's mouth soon after the sun had risen:—
En el tiempo de las barbaras naciones
A los ladrones se les colgaban en cruces;
Pero hoy en el siglo de las luces