“While coffee can be successfully cultivated under a temperature of 60 degrees F., the cocoa-tree, for proper development and remunerative crops, requires a temperature of 80 degrees F.; hence the area of the cocoa belt is comparatively restricted, and the cocoa-planter presumably has not to fear the fierce competition that he has encountered in the cultivation of cotton and coffee. Besides the condition of temperature above stated, this crop needs a moist soil and humid atmosphere; and so the lands along the coast of the Caribbean sea, sloping from the mountain-tops to the shore, bedewed by the exhalations of the sea and irrigated by the numerous rivulets that course down the valleys, are found to be, in all respects, well adapted to the profitable cultivation of cocoa. And while the lands in the interior possessing facilities for irrigation may be said to be equally as good for the purpose, yet the absence of roads, and the consequently difficult transportation of produce on the backs of donkeys over rugged mountain paths, materially reduce the profits on the crop before it reaches the market. “A cocoa plantation is set in quite the same manner as an apple-orchard, except that the young stalks may be transplanted from the nursery after two months’ growth. No preparation of the soil is deemed necessary, and no manures are applied. The young trees are planted about fifteen feet equidistant, which will accommodate two hundred trees to the acre. Between rows, and at like spaces, are planted rows of the Bucare, a tree of rapid growth, that serves to shade the soil as well as to shield the young trees from the torrid sun. Small permanent trenches must be maintained from tree to tree throughout the entire length of the rows, so that, at least once in the week, the stream, descending from the mountains, may be turned into these little channels and bear needful moisture to trees and soil. At the age of five years the plantation begins to bear fruit, and annually yields two crops, that ripening in June being termed the crop of San Juan, and that maturing at Christmas being known as the crop of La Navidad. The average age to which the trees attain, under proper care, may be estimated at forty years, during which period it will give fair to full crops of fruit; but of course it must be understood that, as in our fruit orchards, a new tree must be set from time to time to replace one that may be decayed or blighted. After careful inquiry it may be safely stated that the average crop of the cocoa plantation at ten years of age, and under a proper state of cultivation, will amount to five hundred or six hundred pounds per acre.” The method of preparing the fruit for shipment is thus described in the “Encyclopædia Britannica”:--