h the yield per acre,
each tree would therefore give 9.33 ounces of marketable coffee,
whilst in Peru, where the coffee-tree is planted at an elevation of
5,000 to 6,000 feet above sea-level, each tree is said to yield one
pound weight of beans.

In the Philippines the fresh ripe berries, when thoroughly sun-dried,
lose an average weight of 52 per cent. moisture.

The sun-dried berries ready for pounding (husking) give an average
of 33.70 of their weight in marketable coffee-beans.

It takes _eight_ cabanes measure (_vide_ p. 276) of fresh-picked ripe
berries to turn out _one_ picul weight of clean beans.

Owing to the fact that one year in every five gives a short crop,
due either to the nature of the plant or to climatic variations,
it pays better to collect coffee from the very small growers rather
than sink capital in large estates on the _aparcero_ system (q.v.).

The coffee-plant imperatively requires shade and moisture, and
over-pruning is prejudicial. If allowed to run to its natural height
it would grow up to 15 to 25 feet high, but it is usually kept
at 7 to 10 feet. The leaves are evergreen, very shining, oblong,
leathery, and much resemble those of the common laurel. The flowers
are small, and cluster in the axils of the leaves. They are somewhat
similar to the Spanish jasmine, and being snow-white, the effect
of a coffee plantation in bloom is delightful, whilst the odour is
fragrant. The fruit, when ripe, is of a dark scarlet colour, and the
ordinary coffee-berry contains two semi-elliptic seeds of a horny or
cartilaginous nature glued together and enveloped in a coriaceous
membrane; when this is removed each seed is found covered with a
silver-grey pellicle.

The _Caracolillo_ coffee-berry contains only one seed, with a furrow
in the direction of the long axis, which gives it the appearance of
being a geminous seed with an inclination to open out on one side.

In Arabia Felix, where coffee was first planted in the 15th century,
and its cultivation is still extensive, the collection of the fruit
is effected by spreading cloths under the trees, from which, on being
violently shaken, the ripe berries fall, and are then placed upon
mats to dry, after which the beans are pressed under a heavy roller.

In the Philippines, women and children--sometimes men--go into the
plantations with baskets and pick the berries. The fruit is then
heaped, and, in a few days, washed, so that a great portion of the
pul