is the method of making the sugar called Muscovado. It is drained a
few days, and then the railways take it to Matanzas or to Havana. We
visited afterward a plantation in the neighborhood, in which clayed sugar
is made. Our host furnished us with horses to make the excursion, and we
took a winding road, over hill and valley, by plantations and forests,
till we stopped at the gate of an extensive pasture-ground. An old negro,
whose hut was at hand, opened it for us, and bowed low as we passed. A
ride of half a mile further brought us in sight of the cane-fields of the
plantation called Saratoga, belonging to the house of Drake & Company, of
Havana, and reputed one of the finest of the island. It had a different
aspect from any plantation we had seen. Trees and shrubs there were none,
but the canes, except where they had been newly cropped for the mill,
clothed the slopes and hollows with their light-green blades, like the
herbage of a prairie.

We were kindly received by the administrator of the estate, an intelligent
Biscayan, who showed us the whole process of making clayed sugar. It does
not differ from that of making the Muscovado, so far as concerns the
grinding and boiling. When, however, the sugar is nearly cool, it is
poured into iron vessels of conical shape, with the point downward, at
which is an opening. The top of the sugar is then covered with a sort of
black thick mud, which they call clay, and which is several times renewed
as it becomes dry. The moisture from the clay passes through the sugar,
carrying with it the cruder portions, which form molasses. In a few days
the draining is complete.

We saw the work-people of the Saratoga estate preparing for the market the
sugar thus cleansed, if we may apply the word to such a process. With a
rude iron blade they cleft the large loaf of sugar just taken from the
mould into three parts, called first, second, and third quality, according
to their whiteness. These are dried in the sun on separate platforms of
wood with a raised edge; the women standing and walking over the fragments
with their bare dirty feet, and beating them smaller with wooden mallets
and clubs. 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