Salvador of the Twentieth Century

by Percy F. Martin

Sugar-cane growing is an industry for which the genial climate and the bounteous soil of Salvador are admirably adapted, and the cane is cultivated to a greater or less extent in all of the fourteen different Departments. As I have pointed out in another part of this volume, when describing sugar machinery (see Chapter XII.), there is a great need of improved equipment, which, were it provided, would probably serve to double, and even in some cases to treble, the amount of this particular product. But even with the imperfect reduction work which is carried out upon nine-tenths of the fincas, sugar is produced to such an extent as not only to abundantly supply the home requirements, but to provide a considerable share of the country's exports. The greater part of the sugar used in the country is turned out in the shape of small blocks or cakes, weighing about 2 pounds each, and bearing the name of panela, similar to that produced in Brazil and Mexico. A large quantity of this stuff, which looks and tastes very much like toffee, while it also resembles the maple sugar of North America, is used in the manufacture of native rum. Conical-shaped loaves of compact white sugar, weighing from 25 to 40 pounds each, are also manufactured, but are mostly made for export.

In the "golden days" of California, the greater part of the rum which was consumed upon the gold-fields came from Sonsonate in Salvador, being packed in 14 and 15 gallon casks and greybeards of from 3 to 6 gallons, suitable for easy transport to the Californian diggings.

For some years past Salvador has been gaining a reputation for the excellent quality of its tobacco, and there are several manufactories established in the Republic, which are doing remarkably well. One of the best known for cigars is that of Señora Josefa B. de Diaz, the amiable proprietress of the Hotel América, at Cojutepeque.

Half a century ago Salvador was exporting tobacco to Mexico, and had been doing a fair amount of trade with that country even in the time of the Spanish dominion. The tobacco production collectively in all the provinces of the Republic yield a net revenue to the Government of more than £500,000 annually; but the method of administering and collecting the taxes in former times helped as much as anything else to retard the industry. For instance, under the old régime a general system was subscribed, and scrupulously adhered to, which precluded people from raising tobacco, except when they should obtain a licence to do so from the authorities; and the growers, under one of the many irritating conditions attached to the official permission, were bound to deliver the entire crop, after it had been dried and prepared, into the Government factories at a stipulated rate per pound; it was then retailed to the community at a fixed price, and yielded the substantial revenue referred to. Later on each province passed its own laws for regulating this branch of the public income, and, inasmuch as these laws were neither uniform nor permanent, great confusion prevailed and much loss was incurred, while an immense amount of smuggling went on, as may well be believed.

The Government of Salvador of recent years has adopted quite different methods, and has done much to encourage the industry, such, for instance, as importing tobacco-seed and distributing it gratis among cultivators, with the idea of promoting the culture of the plant; while at the same time it has imported native cultivators from Cuba for the purpose of teaching the method of growing and working the tobacco as practised on that island. In spite of this free and valuable instruction, I am afraid that the methods of handling the tobacco in Salvador are often found to be decidedly primitive, the growers allowing the leaves to dry in the sun without detaching them from the stalks, the latter being cut a few inches above the ground. They are then piled in stacks from 6 to 9 feet in diameter and from 3 to 4 feet in height, heavy weights being placed on the top, and the whole covered over with a thick layer of banana leaves. Fermentation then ensues, and by this action the colour and aroma of the leaves are brought out. Only by guesswork is it decided when the process is complete, and the tobacco is then taken from the stack, exposed for a short time to the air, whereafter the leaves are detached from the stalks, sorted, and tied into bundles, and then sent to market. It will be recognized that the choiceness of the tobacco and its excellent quality must be very high when they can withstand successfully such a crude treatment as this. How much more valuable might the plant's product become as a commodity, and how much higher would be the revenue yielded, were modern methods of treating the leaf to be introduced!

In some sections of Salvador tobacco-growers have resorted to an ingenious method of ridding the tobacco-leaves of destructive insects and worms that feed upon the tender young plants at certain periods of their development. A kind of turkey, known locally under the name of "chompipe," a bird which was brought originally from the West Indies, and is capable of being easily domesticated, is kept in flocks of considerable size in the vicinity of the tobacco-fields, and at certain hours of the day these are driven through the fields in order to rid the tobacco-plants of worms and insects.

These turkeys do their work so well that the smallest insect fails to escape them, and yet they pick them off with such care that the tender leaves remain free from injury. Without the use of these fowls, labourers must be employed to go through the fields at stated intervals to pick off the insects and worms from the leaves; and this method, aside from being tedious and unsatisfactory, often damages the leaves through rough handling, causing defective development and a reduction of their value as a marketable product.

I found, in my travels through the country, other classes of agriculture being pursued besides those which have been mentioned. For instance, india-rubber is a distinctly profitable branch, in spite of the primitive methods pursued in collecting it, and which are still, for the most part, in vogue. The Government has made many earnest efforts to improve conditions and to teach the people how to both cultivate and to collect the precious material, but it is not possible to congratulate those who pursue the industry upon the amount of success attained. I have been shown the extensive forests of promising-looking rubber-trees growing in the provinces of La Paz, La Unión, San Miguel, and Usulután; but when I inquired into the methods followed by those who are employed in collecting the gum, I found the most wasteful system in force, and the work generally conducted in a desultory, indifferent manner, with the result that it hardly paid to follow the occupation at all. Under properly organized labour and systematically managed, rubber-growing ought to, and no doubt one day will, become a valuable feature of the country's industries.

Then, again, rice is cultivated, but not at all scientifically. Nevertheless some fairly good crops are annually gathered in, mostly of the upland variety, and grown upon the tablelands and hillsides. Very little rice, comparatively speaking, is exported, the greater part of that produced being consumed locally. Some of the neighbouring Republics take a small quantity of the grain from Salvador, but as a rule these States grow their own supplies, and need but little importation. It seems a great pity that, with land so eminently suitable for rice cultivation, so little—and that little of such poor quality—should be annually produced in Salvador.

Cacao is one of the leading products of this much-favoured country, and it can be found growing more luxuriantly in Salvador than in any of the Central American States. Very little attention is given, however, to the method of cultivation, in spite of the fact that cacao is one of the oldest agricultural specialities of this country. History shows that at one time Sonsonate and San Vicente were famous alike for the quantity and the excellence of the cacao grown there. Such plants as are cultivated now are utilized almost entirely in the country in the manufacture of chocolate, etc., and this product figures but insignificantly among the country's exports.