Sorting.—Tobacco intended for smoking should be carefully sorted when stripped. There should be four sorts: 1st, large, equally good coloured, untorn leaves; 2nd, leaves of good size and colour, but torn; 3rd, leaves of inferior colour, and bottom leaves; 4th, refuse, shrivelled-up leaves, &c., to which may be added the suckers No. 1 leaves, when thin, elastic, and of good sorts, are mostly valued as wrappers (outside covers) for cigars, No. 2 may also be used as wrappers, but are less valued than No. 1; they are adapted for fillers and cut tobacco. The different sorts are kept separate. The best plan is to let the most intelligent man strip the leaves from the stem, and at once separate them according to quality. The leaves should then be made into hands, i.e. 10–20 leaves should be tied together by twisting a leaf round the end of the stalks, each sort being attended by a special man, to avoid mixing. The leaves of the first sort being large, 10–15 will be sufficient for a hand; more are required of the other sorts. When making the hands of the two first sorts, each leaf is taken separately, smoothened on a flat board, and left there while another is treated in the same way, continuing thus until a sufficient number is ready to make a hand. When the hand is ready, it is laid aside, and a weight is placed upon it to keep the leaves smooth.
To sell well, according to Perry Hull, tobacco “should be assorted into three classes or grades, Wrappers, Seconds, and Fillers. The wrappers will include the soundest, best-coloured leaves, the colour (a dark cinnamon) should be as uniform as possible; this quality should include nothing but what is fit for wrappers. The Seconds, which are used as binders for cigars, &c., will include the small top leaves, of which, if the tobacco was topped too high, there will be one or two to each plant—the bad colours, and those leaves somewhat damaged by worms and bad handling, but not so much so as to be ragged. The third class, or Fillers, will include the balance of the crop, bottom leaves, ragged leaves, &c. The tobacco should be done up into hanks of about ⅓ lb. each, or about what can be encompassed by the thumb and fingers, winding at the butt with a pliable leaf, drawing the end through the hank to secure it.”
The Cuban system of sorting is described at considerable length by Mitjen, whose remarks are interpreted by Burton as follows. The operation consists in “separating one from the other the different leaves, according to their strength and quality, and dividing the produce of the crop into various classes. These are, in practice, styled Libra, 1st quality; Quebrado, 2nd quality, broken; Injuriado de primera; Injuriado de segunda, de tercera, de cuarta, de quinta, de sexta, de setima; Libra de pie, and capadura.
“Under this classification it is presumed that attention has been bestowed, not only to the special quality of the leaf, but also to its size, and its state, whether whole or broken; but it is very seldom that exactness is found in this classification, because but very few persons possess the requisite skill which such a complicated mode of sorting requires. Moreover, by the abuse of mixing in one heap all kinds of leaves, frequently brought in from the fields all mixed together, the proper sorting of tobacco becomes a very complicated affair.
“This kind of classification and nomenclature is, moreover, absurd, and does not positively represent fixed qualities, under the denomination of which, prices might be arranged which would serve as a guide to the merchant as well as the grower. In a word, the names, with which the different qualities of tobacco are to-day distinguished, signify nothing, and it is ridiculous to be guided in business by them. Until this kind of classification and nomenclature is changed, it is impossible to quote the mercantile prices for the different qualities, because the name does not represent the quality; and this confusion tends greatly to the prejudice of the planter, and the merchant; and hinders attaining the perfection after which we should strive.
“We have shown that the practice of making a classification of seven Injuriados must not be taken as absolute. There are better modes of sorting in which a separation of 8, and even 9 Injuriados should be made, and others, and by far the greater proportion, in which only 5 Injuriados should be separated; so that the quality which, in one sorting, would appear under that of fifths—being the lowest of the crop—would be equal to eighths, or ninths, if picked more carefully; and the fifths, in a sorting, whose lowest class may be sevenths, is about equal in quality to that of thirds of other pickings, whose lowest class would be fifths, if both crops had produced equal kinds of tobacco.
“There is even more to confirm our opinion. Supposing two crops equal in all respects, and that each planter makes a separation of 7 Injuriados. This would not ensure that the intrinsic value of each respective quality would be equal; for each Veguero has his own particular mode of considering the different classes, and some make a much more careful sorting than others. In the supposed case it may happen, as it frequently does, that the Veguero A will take from his crop—which we will suppose to be one hundred packages—2 of the first, 3 of the second, 5 of the third, 8 of the fourth, 12 of the fifth, 30 of the sixth, and 40 of the seventh; whereas the Veguero B will take from his, 4 of the first, 6 of the second, 10 of the third, 16 of the fourth, 32 of the fifth, 21 of the sixth, and 11 of the seventh; and it would result, from the comparison of these two supposed pickings, that each of these classes of the Vega A would correspond to the immediate superior one of the Vega B, as will be shown on the following calculation:—
| A. | B. | ||||||||||||
| $ | $ | $ | $ | ||||||||||
| 2 | Bales, | 1st | at | 120 | = | 240 | 4 | Bales, | 1st | at | 100 | = | 400 |
| 3 | ” | 2nd | ” | 100 | = | 300 | 6 | ” | 2nd | ” | 80 | = | 480 |
| 5 | ” | 3rd | ” | 80 | = | 400 | 10 | ” | 3rd | ” | 60 | = | 600 |
| 8 | ” | 4th | ” | 60 | = | 480 | 16 | ” | 4th | ” | 40 | = | 640 |
| 12 | ” | 5th | ” | 40 | = | 480 | 32 | ” | 5th | ” | 25 | = | 800 |
| 30 | ” | 6th | ” | 25 | = | 750 | 21 | ” | 6th | ” | 20 | = | 420 |
| 40 | ” | 7th | ” | 20 | = | 800 | 11 | ” | 7th | ” | 10 | = | 110 |
| 100 | $3450 | 100 | $3450 | ||||||||||
“Here it may be seen that the second of A is worth as much as the first of B, the third of A as much as the second of B, and so successively in the other classes; and as it is of importance that names should represent fixed objects, and that each quality should represent a relative value, we think that the sortings and the classifications deserve a reform, which would undoubtedly bring with it advantages to the planter, to the merchant, the manufacturer, and the consumer.
“The reform in the sortings should take its origin from a reform in the plantation or field, and principally in the manner of cutting. By observing a methodical and well-calculated system, each one of the operations prepares and facilitates the execution of the succeeding one. In its proper place, we have recommended that the tobacco planter should not attempt to plant more than 12,000 plants for each labourer employed, so that all the plants may receive proper cultivation and attention. If all these plants are equally well taken care of, if the land has been properly prepared with manure, and all have had the same advantage of season, it is a necessary consequence that the fruit will be equally good. If afterwards the cutting or cropping is made in 3 sections, preserving always the separation we have recommended, we shall have, naturally, not a capricious assortment of leaves, but one in the order established by nature.