India rubber grows wild in the forests and could be cultivated profitably, as it is now being done in Mexico and other countries. The government will give one _manzana_ (113.62 acres) of land as a bonus for every two thousand rubber plants set out for cultivation. Sugar cane can be raised profitably, as the stalks grow high, with many joints, and have a greater percentage of saccharine than in most countries where it is cultivated. Furthermore, it does not require replanting for years in this soil. The stalks will grow nine feet high in as many months. At present about the only use to which the cane is devoted here is in the manufacture of “white-eye,” the native brandy. Some of it is made into sugar by means of old-fashioned sugar mills, which are simply vertical iron-roll mills turned by oxen. There is only one kettle used and no clarifier, and the syrup is run into wooden moulds, where it is cooled into dark hemispherical blocks—a form much liked by the Indians.
The Guatemalan cacao is claimed to be the very best in the world. It is not cultivated to any great extent at present, although the propagation is on the increase, as Ecuador practically controls the trade. The best conditions are an altitude of from eight hundred to two thousand feet and a soil rich in moisture, or capable of irrigation. Virgin lands from which forests have been cut are the best. It requires six years for the trees to mature, although they will occasionally bear in less time. The cultivation does not require nearly so much labour as coffee, although care must be taken not to hurt the “bean” when it is removed from the pod. One day is given for “fermentation;” after which they are dried in the sun for several days. The cacao is then ready for the market to furnish our delicious chocolate preparations. The pods are from ten to twelve inches long and contain many beans; they resemble a musk melon in appearance, and grow from the branches and trunks of the trees.
Nutmegs have proved a success on the Island of Trinidad and would do just as well here. The trees require at least eighty inches of rain annually. They will produce nutmegs in eight to ten years and will then bear and improve for a century. Each tree will yield from one thousand to five thousand nuts in a season, in size varying from sixty-eight to one hundred and twenty in a pound. Tobacco grows well and of good quality at an elevation of from one thousand to two thousand feet. Common and sweet potatoes, yams, beans, breadfruit, squashes, melons, tomatoes, peppers, the _aguacate_, or alligator pear (weighing about a pound), the _granadilla_ (fruit of the passion flower), and many other fruits and vegetables can easily be cultivated at a fair profit.