SUGAR.
By this time the ponies had been brought up, and the young riders started off.
How high the sugar-canes stood! The children could not see over the tops, even from their ponies' backs. The long, narrow leaves hung down much like our own Indian corn. Far up on each plant was a feathery white plume. The stalks were now a golden yellow colour. This was Mother Nature's sign that the cane was full of sap.
At Maria's home the cane had been already cut and made into sugar. But there were only two or three fields. Here, on Lucia's plantation, there were hundreds of acres. The men had been working for weeks already, and it was not yet half cut.
"Oh, look, Ramon!" said Maria, "see that dear little black baby asleep between the canes. She can't be more than two years old. The other children must have gone away and forgotten her."
Ramon jumped down, and, picking up the little tot, lifted her up in front of him on the pony's back. She had been waked up so suddenly that she began to cry. But when the others smiled at her she rolled her big eyes around, and soon began to laugh. She was going to have a ride with white children, and that was a grand event in her life.
A turn in the rough road showed an ox-cart ahead. How small the Cuban oxen are! But they are such gentle, patient creatures, a child could drive them. How they pushed ahead with their heavy load!
When they were young a hole had been bored through the centre of their nostrils, and an iron ring was passed through. When the oxen were harnessed a rope was fastened on each side of this ring. The black driver held the ends of the rope, and guided the oxen. He had no whip, for it was not needed.
"Let's follow him up to the top of the hill," said Lucia. "He must carry his load to the boiler-house that way, and I do like to watch the oxen go down a steep place. There, see! The man will not even get off; he's perfectly safe."