Identifier: brazilamazonscoa00smit (find matches)
Title: Brazil, the Amazons and the coast
Year: 1879 (1870s)
Authors: Smith, Herbert H. (Herbert Huntington), 1851-1919
Subjects: Folklore -- Brazil Brazil -- Description and travel Brazil -- Economic conditions Amazon River Valley -- Description and travel
Publisher: New York : C. Scribner's Sons
Contributing Library: Brown University Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Brown University

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ing two months of the year.But latterly the plantations have been neglected; many treeshave been killed by long floods, and during some years thecrops have failed almost entirely; the rubber-trade hasruined this, as it has almost every productive industry. At present about seven million pounds of cacao are ex-ported every year ; nearly all of this goes to France ; a littleto England ; last year none at all was sent to the UnitedStates. The market value in Para has steadily risen, from THE RIVER-PLAIN. 113 seven and one-half cents per pound in 1874 to twelve andone-half cents by present quotations.^ For my part, I cannot see why chocolate is not manu-factured in connection with large orchards. At present,cacao goes to France or England, and is there made intochocolate or coco. Thence some of it is sent to theUnited States, reaching the American consumer after payingthree or four duties, and the profits of a dozen merchants, be-sides those of the manufacturers. The product prepared from
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Drying Cacao. fresh seed, and packed in tin, would be much better in everyrespect than that which we get at home, and probably theexport duty at Para would be no more than for the seed. As it is, we hardly know the taste of the drink, and we donot appreciate it at all. One who is accustomed to a gener-ous bowl of tJiick chocolate every day can excuse the enthu-siasm that called it Theobroma, * Nectar of the gods. This * January, 1879. 114 BRAZIL. is not a stimulant, like coffee and tea ; it is a mild, nourish-ing food, in a very condensed form. I have proved by myown experience that it may be used to advantage as a sub-stitute for meat ; a friend, who has often made long explora-tions in the forest, told me that he always carried chocolate,as the most compact and useful food that he could find. The grazing industry is gradually assuming very largeproportions on the Middle Amazons, as it has heretofore onMarajo. It is true that the herds do not compare, and prob-ably never will, with t

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