The sugar of the first quality is then scraped up and put into
boxes; that of the second and third, being moister, is handled a third
time and carried into the drying-room, where it is exposed to the heat of
a stove, and when sufficiently dry, is boxed up for market like the other.
The sight of these processes was not of a nature to make one think with
much satisfaction of clayed sugar as an ingredient of food, but the
inhabitants of the island are superior to such prejudices, and use it with
as little scruple as they who do not know in what manner it is made.
In the afternoon we returned to the dwelling of our American host, and
taking the train at _Caobas_, or Mahogany Trees - so called from the former
growth of that tree on the spot - we were at Matanzas an hour afterward.
The next morning the train brought us to this little town, situated
half-way between Matanzas and Havana, but a considerable distance to the
south of either.
Letter XLIX.
Negroes in Cuba. - Indian Slaves.
Havana, _April_ 22, 1849.
The other day when we were at Guines, we heard that a negro was to suffer
death early the next morning by the _garrote_, an instrument by which the
neck of the criminal is broken and life extinguished in an instant. I
asked our landlady for what crime the man had been condemned.
"He has killed his master," she replied, "an old man, in his bed."
"Had he received any provocation?"
"Not that I have heard; but another slave is to be put to death by the
_garrote_ in about a fortnight, whose offense had some palliation. His
master was a man of harsh temper, and treated his slaves with extreme
severity; the negro watched his opportunity, and shot him as he sat at
table."
We went to the place of execution a little before eight o'clock, and found
the preparations already made. A platform had been erected, on which stood
a seat for the prisoner, and back of the seat a post was fixed, with a
sort of iron collar for his neck. A screw, with a long transverse handle
on the side of the post opposite to the collar, was so contrived that,
when it was turned, it would push forward an iron bolt against the back of
the neck and crush the spine at once.
Sentinels in uniform were walking to and fro, keeping the spectators at a
distance from the platform. The heat of the sun was intense, for the
sea-breeze had not yet sprung up, but the crowd had begun to assemble.
