Ten or fifteen years ago we rarely saw cigarettes in this country, their use being confined to the few natives who had acquired the habit during a residence abroad, and to foreigners, French, Italian, and Cuban settlers, who followed the practices of their youth. So slight was the general demand that, excepting in the large cities, cigarettes were rarely found for sale. To-day there are probably few small towns in the thickly settled portions of the country where cigarettes are not readily obtained; while in the large cities the stores vie with each other in giving us varied assortments of leading brands. Indeed, recent statistics state that nearly thirty per cent. of the entire smoking tobacco consumed in the United States is in this form. Cigarettes are now imported from all portions of Europe, but principally from France. Several factories have of late years been started in our own country, but the cigarette par excellence is made in Havana. Nowhere else do we find capital so largely invested, labor so diversified, or such attention to details. There certainly you can take your choice—Honoradez, Havana, Astrea, Cherito, Henriquez, and dozens of others of lesser note.
The tobacco used in the making of the Havana cigarettes is bought from the cigar factors, but only from those who have the most assured reputation. It consists of the leaves left from the making of cigars. The necessity of securing the best grades of tobacco cannot be overestimated. The judgment of the cigarette smoker is formed solely from the sense of taste. He is totally unaffected by sight, which in the cigar enables a clever workman to so roll bad tobacco that we are predisposed in favor of an inferior article. While absolute inferiority is intolerable in either, mediocrity, in Cuba at all events, is much more readily tolerated in the cigar than in the cigarette.
The tobacco for the cigarette is not, as is generally supposed with us, raised on the plantations of the various leading cigar factors. "Bartegas," "Cobania," "Upman," or whatever be the name of our favorite brand, does not depend for its success upon any one plantation. The practice on the part of the leading houses is to send their purchasing agents into the tobacco district as soon as the crop begins to ripen. Sales are then and there arranged, immense sums sometimes being offered in advance, by way of retainer, for a specially likely plantation. The Vuelto Abago district is the favorite one, the planters there holding a position not unlike that occupied by the proprietors of the "Sea Island" plantations in days when "cotton was king." The ability to control the market so as to bring to their own manufactories the choicest tobacco is the main secret of the success of the larger houses, not, as is frequently supposed, any particular superiority in the workmen.
The principal cigarette factory is, as is well known, the factory of M. Susini, "La Honoradez," "Honoradez" signifying in Spanish, honesty, the motto of the house. It consists of a series of irregular buildings, covering an area in space about equal to that occupied by the usual Broadway block. On the upper floor of the principal building we find a lot of tobacco, which has just arrived, and is being prepared for inspection; the first requisite being to remove from it any leaves that are either dead or in any way injured. The tobacco lays loosely scattered over an immense wooden tray, which is kept continually moving, by means of machinery, from one end of a table to the other. Around this table are seated some twelve or fourteen Cuban workmen, all good judges of tobacco. Each one throws aside such leaves as he deems unfit for use, while the slow but yet continual motion given to the tray brings each imperfection successively before the eyes of all. The next step is to free the tobacco from any particles of sand or earth that may adhere to it. This is done by moving the tray by machinery, until it is over a large bin, into which the tobacco is allowed to fall, being subjected in its passage to a powerful current of air induced by means of an immense fan, likewise worked by machinery. One step more, and a very simple one—that of drying—and the tobacco is ready for a change of form. The tobacco is dried by simply exposing it on the roof, for a few hours, to the heat of the sun. For cigarettes it can scarcely be too dry, or for cigars too damp. A Cuban would not think of smoking other than a damp cigar. In the factories one sees the workmen smoking cigars they have just rolled, and no native could understand why one should smoke dry cigars in which so much of the natural flavor has been lost.
Thus far the process has been entirely one of cleansing or of freeing from impurities. The next step is that of cutting the leaves into fine particles in order to adapt the tobacco for cigarettes. The scattered leaves are first collected and subjected to powerful hydraulic pressure, from which they come out looking for all the world like a pile of snuff-colored brick. The moulded tobacco next goes to the cutting machine, falling from thence into a sieve, the meshes of which pass only such pieces as have been reduced to the proper size. The remainder is passed into a hopper, and thence goes for a second cutting. One step more, and the tobacco will be issued to the "rollers." Some half a dozen Chinese enter the room, each carrying with him a small vessel containing an aromatic liquid, with which the loose tobacco is carefully sprinkled. The preparation of this liquid is not known. It is doubtless the desire to keep it secret that leads to the preference of Chinese over native labor.
Before following the tobacco furher, let us look at the remaining portion of the cigarette, the wrapper. The original envelope for the tobacco was doubtless composed of leaves, the followers of Columbus carrying back to Spain accounts of the strange custom existing among the natives of San Salvador, the smoking of tobacco wrapped in the leaves of the palm, which was doubtless the primitive cigarette. In France to this day new straws are much used, but generally paper has become the popular envelope. This paper must be specially manufactured. Most of it comes from Barcelona, where the making of cigarette paper constitutes an important industry. All of that used at the "Honoradez" factory, after inspection, is carefully stamped with the name "Susini." By unrolling any of this brand of cigarettes this mark can be readily seen, and serves as the readiest means of detecting counterfeits. A portion of the paper is sprinkled with various preparations to give to it the flavor of tea, licorice, or such other taste as may suit certain consumers. This explains the variation in the color of the wrapper, which is sometimes straw-color, sometimes brown, but more usually white, the latter color distinguishing the paper which has not been artificially flavored. In the cutting machine the paper is rapidly converted into the proper size for envelopes, while another machine close at hand is turning out little bits of pasteboard for such of the cigarettes as are to be made with a mouthpiece.
Both tobacco and paper are now ready to be given out to the "rollers." Let us go down and watch them as they come pouring in. Both sexes and all ages have representations here. Each one awaits his turn, and then receives, after it has been carefully weighed, his or her allowance of tobacco, some five thousand papers, and a large wooden hoop. The hoop serves as a rude but very accurate gauge, its circumference being of such a size as to properly encompass five thousand cigarettes of such size as will contain the entire amount of tobacco issued. A slight excess of both tobacco and paper, say sufficient to make forty or fifty cigarettes, is usually given, intended for the personal consumption of the employee. When their work is completed and returned to the factory, they receive in exchange therefor a small copper check payable on demand. So common are these checks in Havana that a few years since—possibly it may be so still—they were constantly given to one at the various stores, and were commonly received as current coin.
Physically the cigar and cigarette makers are a sorry lot. The continual odor of tobacco, their constant labor, with bodies bent over tables, calling into play no muscle, no exertion, indeed, whatever, excepting the exercise of their fingers—this cannot fail to have its effect. The cigarette makers are injured, too, by the inhalation of an almost invisible dust arising from the small particles of tobacco. The compensation received appears very small. Four or five cigarettes a minute is accounted good work, and even at this rate two days' steady labor is required to fill a hoop, for which they receive less than two dollars.
The larger number of cigarettes manufactured at Havana are made by machinery which is exceedingly ingenious, and has proved thoroughly successful. The cigarettes made by machinery are not only more tightly wrapped, but also manufactured at a much reduced cost. Each machine is capable of making thirty cigarettes per minute, 1,800 per hour, or 43,200 per day, thus replacing the labor of fourteen men, presuming them to be capable of working ten hours per day. For such persons as prefer making their own cigarettes, pressed packages of tobacco, with little paper books containing the envelopes, are sold. The tobacco is so neatly put up that were it not for the accompanying book, one would almost fancy it to be a package of the most delicate French chocolate. As illustration of the consumption of cigarettes it may be of interest to state that three million cigarettes are made in the Honoradez factory each year, while it is estimated that in their manufacture over six million dollars is annually expended in the city of Havana alone. The Cuban, indeed, is much more of a cigarette than a cigar smoker; the cigarette is his constant companion. Even after dinner the cigarette seems to be preferred. I remember once, at a very charming dinner party, being quite astonished—for it was shortly after my arrival in Havana—to find myself and the host the only cigar smokers. The rest of our number, some six or seven, all Cubans, took to their accustomed cigarette with a unanimity which has always led me to believe that my good host himself felt called upon by his sense of politeness to do violence to his own preference.