The mango is nearly as abundant and prolific as the banana in some places. It grows on a very handsome tree, the leaves being long, lanceolate, polished, and hanging in dense masses of dark-green foliage. In size it is like a full-grown apple tree. The fruit is about the size of an egg plum, and when ripe is yellow in colour and very juicy. They grow in long, pendent branches, and the rich, juicy, golden-meated fruit is not only attractive to the eye, but delightful to the palate.
That great broad-leaved, useful plant so characteristic of the tropics, the banana, grows in great profusion in Guatemala, where there are fully two hundred varieties. Many of them are too delicate for transportation so they will never become a factor in commerce. All through the lowlands of Guatemala and even up to an elevation of two thousand and more feet, the banana is more common than the apple tree in New England; and few indeed are the native shacks in those sections that do not have their banana grove near. The uses of the banana in its natural habitat are so many, and its growth is so exuberant, that it might be classed, with equal propriety, as a weed, a vegetable, or a fruit.
Along the line of the Guatemala Northern Railway and the borders of Lake Izabal, with its connecting streams, are thousands of acres just as well suited to the cultivation of this delicious fruit as the neighbouring republic of Honduras, or more distant Costa Rica. Much of the land belongs to the public domain and can be secured for a small sum, although the first cost probably represents not more than one-third of the investment that will be found necessary. The land must be cleared, although this is a simple matter, for the trees and underbrush are simply left where they fall, as decay is very rapid in this climate; and the banana shoots, called hijos, are planted in the midst of the rubbish from twelve to fifteen feet apart. After about nine months the stalk will bear and the bunch of bananas is cut while still green. The parent stalk is cut down and one or more shoots will spring up from the roots which will bear fruit in the same time. Thus a marketable crop is produced each week, bringing in a steady and unceasing revenue.
The banana has a curious and prodigal method of propagation. Even before the fruit of the parent stalk has matured, new stalks begin to spring up from the roots. As this process is repeated indefinitely it follows that unless these surplus stalks are cut out, a banana field would soon become a miniature jungle. Some growers follow the plan of allowing four shoots to grow in one hill, and their gradations are so arranged that while the oldest is bearing fruit the second is in blossom, the third is half-grown, and the fourth is just coming forth from the ground. In the majority of cases a new shoot will spring up from the old stalk if cut near the ground and there is plenty of rain.
The rapidity of growth of this shoot is a marvel of tropical hustling. A prominent naturalist has made a record of the growth during the first few hours which seems almost incredible, but is true. Twenty minutes after the stalk was cut, the new shoot could be seen pushing up from the center of the cut. Eight hours after cutting, the shoot was nearly two feet in height with the leaves forming. Thirty-one hours after cutting there were four well-developed and perfect leaves and the new shoot constituted quite a respectable looking tree. This great rapidity of growth is due to the spirally-wrapped leaves that are contained within the banana stalk, and which are merely pushed upward and unroll. It is a fact that under those circumstances the growth is so rapid that it is almost discernible to the eye. Stalks grown in this way, it is said, seldom bloom or bear fruit.
The requirements for successful cultivation of this fruit are a deep, alluvial soil, and plenty of water either by rain or irrigation. The nature of the soil, however, seems to have less to do with the successful growing of the banana than the amount of rainfall, which should be at least one hundred inches annually, and the temperature, which must be very warm. The best results are obtained near streams, and an occasional overflow is not a disadvantage. About two hundred or two hundred and twenty-five hills to the acre is the usual allowance. The average yield will then be from two hundred and fifty to three hundred bunches of marketable fruit each year. It is practically immune from insect pests, and a worm-eaten banana, or banana stalk, is practically unknown. It is so vigorous that it will hold its own amid all sorts of weeds and climbing vines, although the successful cultivator will keep his fields free from such pests.
A careful writer has said that the same amount of land that will produce enough wheat to support two persons will raise enough bananas to sustain fifty persons. The food value of the banana and plantain, which is larger and perhaps more nutritious than the former, has never been fully exploited. They make an excellent meal which is very nutritious when dried and ground. At the present time most of the profit goes to the transportation company which holds a monopoly of the carrying trade. They are sold to the fruit company for less than half what they are worth in this country. A vessel will carry twenty thousand bunches in addition to a cargo of passengers, and the loss on the fruit does not exceed fifteen per cent. The fact that bananas can not be kept for any length of time, except in cold storage, requires their early marketing; and the further fact that they will not stand much handling requires their shipment in vessels especially constructed for their transportation. These vessels are all owned by one fruit-buying trust. It is no wonder that this monopoly has proved very profitable to its owners. Now that the new railroad is opened up and regular trains are running, this rich banana soil ought to be rapidly developed, since the market for this delicious fruit is constantly increasing and the supply has never yet exceeded the demand. Instead of a million bunches, Guatemala ought to export five or ten million bunches each year.
All over the world the fruits, as well as other articles of the tropics, are coming into greater demand each year. In 1908 the United States imported fruits and other food products of the tropics, not including coffee, to the value of more than two dollars for each man, woman and child in the country. Sugar was by far the largest item on the list, bananas second, and cacao a close rival for that distinction. More than 37,000,000 bunches of bananas were consumed in the United States during that year, an increase of fifty per cent in five years. The general use of the banana is of very recent growth, for it has come into use in Northern climates almost entirely within the last quarter of a century. The Pacific slope of Guatemala, although much less in extent, is far ahead of the Gulf side in cultivation and is far more thickly settled. The chief export from this district is coffee which is cultivated everywhere at an altitude of from one thousand to six thousand feet. The soil is about the same as that of Chiapas, the adjoining Mexican state, which also produces a fine quality of coffee. Thousands of bags of coffee are shipped from the ports of Ocos, Champerico and San Jose, in Guatemala, and San Benito, in Mexico, which is only a few miles from the border. Coffee is not a natural product of this soil, but was first introduced into the New World by a Spanish priest in Guatemala, who obtained the seed in Arabia. It was found adapted to the soil and climate, and coffee is to-day by far the most valuable export, the shipments having reached as high as eighty-five million pounds in one year, worth as much as all other exports together. Most of it is exported to Germany and England, as it is a common saying throughout Mexico and Central America, that only the poor grades of coffee are sent to the greatest coffee-drinking nation in the world—that of Uncle Sam—and the national eagle ought to trail his feathers in the dust at this reflection on his good taste.
DRYING COFFEE.