the island of Cuba the establishment of a great sugar plantation, worked by 300 negroes, and yielding annually 500,000 kilogrammes of sugar, requires an advance of two millions of livres Tournoist, and that it brings in from 300,000 to 350,000+ livres of revenue. The Mexican colonist may choose along the coast, and in the valleys of greater or less depth, the most suitable climate for the sugar cane; and he has less to fear from frost than the colonist of Louisiana. But the extraordinary configuration of the surface of New Spain throws great obstacles in the way of transporting sugar to Vera Cruz. The plantations now in existence are for the most part very remote from the coast opposite to Europe. The country having yet neither canals nor roads fit for carriage, the mule carriage of the sugar to Vera Cruz increases its price a piastre per arroba, or eight sous per kilogramme§. These obstacles will be much diminished by the roads now making from Mexico to Vera Cruz by Orizaba and by Xalapa, along the eastern slope of the Cordilleras. It is also probable that the progress of colonial agriculture will contribute to people the shores *1,103,500 lb. avoird. Trans. t83,340 sterling. Trans. From £12500 to 14581 Sterling. Trans. of New Spain, which for ages have remained desert and uncultivated. It is observed in Mexico that the vezou, or juice expressed from the sugar cane is more or less sugary, according as the plant grows in the plain, or on an elevated table land. The same difference exists in the cane cultivated at Malaga, the Canary Islands, and the Havannah. The elevation of the soil every where produces the same effects on vegetation, as the difference of geographical latitude. The climate has also an influence on the proportion, between the quantities of liquid and crystallizable sugar contained in the juice of the cane; for sometimes the vezou has a very sweet savour, and yet crystallizes with great difficulty. The chemical composition of the vezou is not always the same, and the excellent experiments of M. Proust, have thrown great light on the phenomena discoverable in the American sugar works, many of which are to the sugar refiner the cause of great despondency. From the most exact calculations that I could make at the island of Cuba, I find that a given hectare of ground yields for mean term 12 cubic metres of vezou, from which is drawn by the processes hitherto in use, in which much sugary matter is decomposed by fire, at most from ten to twelve per cent. or 1500 kilogrammes* of raw sugar. They reckon at 3310 lb. avoird. Trans. the Havannah, and in the warm and fertile parts of New Spain, that a caballeria of ground which contains 18 square cordeles (at 24 varas), or 133,517 square metres*, yields annually 2000 arrobas, or 25,000 kilogrammes.† The mean produce, however, is only 1500 arrobas, which is 1400 kilogrammes of sugar per hectare ‡. At St. Domingo, the produce of a carreau of ground containing 3403 toises, or 12,900§ square metres is estimated at 4000 pounds, which is equal to 1550 kilogrammes per hectare. Such is, in general, the fertility of the soil of equinoctial America, that all the sugar consumed in France, which I estimate at 20 millions of kilogrammes, might be produced on a surface of 7 square leagues, an extent which *1,437,163 square feet. Trans. Upwards of 50,000 lb. avoird. Trans. 3089 lb. avoird. p. 107,639 square feet. Trans. | 44,140,000 lb. avoird. Trans. ¶ France drew from her Colonies in 1788, a total of 872,867 quintals of raw sugar, 768,566 of clayed sugar, and 242,074 of sucre tête*. Of this quantity according to M. Peuchet, only 434 thousand quintals of refined sugar were consumed in the kingdom. We learn from the lists published during the ministry of M. Chaptal, that the impor tation of sugar amounted in France in the year 9, to 515,100 quintals. *Sucre lête or sucre de tête is that which is taken from the upper part or head of the conical pot or pan (forme) used in the making of clayed sugar. (Casaux sur l'art de cultivez la canner, p. 453.) Trans. 2 is not the thirtieth part of the smallest department of France. In grounds capable of being watered, and in which plants with tuberous roots, for example batates and ignames, have preceded the cultivation of the sugar cane, the annual produce amounts even to three or four thousand arrobas per caballeria, or to 2100 and 2800 kilogrammes of raw sugar per hectare. Now, in estimating an arroba at three piastres, which is the mean price at Vera Cruz, we find from these data, that a hectare of irrigated ground, will yield to the amount of 2500 or 3400 livres tournois in sugar*, while the same hectare would only yield to the value of 260 livres in wheat, supposing a decuple return, and estimating 100 kilogrammes of wheat at 1600 livres tournois. In drawing a comparison between these two species of cultivation, we must never forget, that the advantages of the sugar cane cultivation are very much diminished, by the enormous advances required in the establishment of a sugar plantation. The greatest part of the sugar produced in New Spain, is consumed in the country. The consumption probably amounts to more than 16 millions of kilogrammest; for that of the Island of Cuba, undoubtedly amounts to from 25 to 30,000 chests (caxas) of 16 ar * From 104 to 141 p. 107,639 square feet. Trans. † Upwards of 35 millions of pounds avoird. Trans. robas, or 200 kilogrammes. Those who have not seen with their own eyes, the enormous quantity of sugar consumed in Spanish America, even in the poorest families, will be astonished to hear, that the whole of France demands for its own wants only three or four times as much sugar as the Island of Cuba, of which the free population does not exceed the number of 340,000 inhabitants. I have endeavoured to bring together in one view, the exportation of sugar from New Spain, and that from the West India Islands. It was impossible for me to reduce all its data, to the same period. I could not procure certain information, as to the actual produce of the English Islands, which has prodigiously increased. The Island of Cuba expor ted in 1803 from the port of the Havannah, 158,000 caxas, and from the port of the Trinity and Santiago de Cuba, including the contraband 3000 caxas; Hence: I believe we may admit, that the whole of the American Islands actually supply Europe |