Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 3 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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Great Britain (Taking That Denomination In Its True Sense, As
Denoting Only England And Scotland) Now Consumes Nearly Two-Thirds
Less Coffee And Three Times More Sugar Than France.
The price of sugar at the Havannah is always by the arroba of 25
Spanish pounds (or 11.49 kilogrammes), and the price of coffee by the
quintal (or 45.97 kilogrammes).
The latter has been known to vary from
4 to 30 piastres; it even fell, in 1808, below 24 reals. The price of
1815 and 1819 was between 13 and 17 piastres the quintal; coffee is
now at 12 piastres. It is probable that the cultivation of coffee
scarcely employs in the whole island of Cuba 28,000 slaves, who
produce, on the yearly average, 305,000 Spanish quintals (14 millions
of kilogrammes), or, according to the present value, 3,660,000
piastres; while 66,000 negroes produce 440,000 cases (81 millions of
kilogrammes) of sugar, which, at the price of 24 piastres, is worth
10,560,000 piastres. It results from this calculation that a slave now
produces the value of 130 piastres of coffee, and 160 piastres of
sugar. It is almost useless to observe that these relations vary with
the price of the two articles, of which the variations are often
opposite and that, in calculations which may throw some light on
agriculture in the tropical region, I comprehend in the same point of
view interior consumption, exportation lawful and contraband.
TOBACCO.
The tobacco of the island of Cuba is celebrated throughout Europe.
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