The Cuba Cane Sugar Corporation was organized and financed upon the strength of a letter written by Mr. Rionda to Messrs. J. & W. Seligman & Co., of New York, on December 16, 1915, in which he made an “estimate that, with sugar at the lowest, say 2 cents per pound, the Corporation would earn at least 1-1/2 times the dividends on its preferred stock.” The f. o. b. production cost for the crop of 1915 and 1916, immediately following, was reported as 2.748 cents per pound, notwithstanding the fact that the sellers of the properties acquired had paid the so-called dead season expenses. It is clear, therefore, that, “with sugar at its lowest, say 2 cents per pound,” the first year’s operations of the corporation would have shown an operating deficit of 0.748 cents per pound, instead of earning “at least 1-1/2 times the dividends on its preferred stock,” as estimated by Mr. Rionda. The large gross operating profits reported for the first year’s operations were, therefore, due in part to the exclusion of the dead season expenses, but mainly to the rise in price of sugar, from 2 cents per pound in July, 1915, to an average of 4.112 cents per pound during the crop season of 1915 and 1916. Such profits might possibly be creditable to Mr. Rionda’s business acumen, but it cannot be justly claimed that they were due to the infallibility of his original estimates, or to his demonstrated administrative capacity for the successful handling of so large and complex an enterprise, the physical conditions of which make administrative co-ordination extremely difficult and expensive. Nevertheless, he has profited by the experience of succeeding years, and shows an increasing capacity for coping with the numerous and complicated problems involved in the administration of the largest sugar producing enterprise in the world; and it is generally conceded that the abnormally large profits now earned by the corporation, as the result of further rises in the price of sugar, will provide for the readjustments of and cover the improvements to the various properties comprised, that are necessary to put the property, taken as a whole, upon an absolutely satisfactory and permanently impregnable footing, physically and financially. This goal is known to accord with Mr. Rionda’s ardent desire, as constituting the consummation of his most commendable aspirations, and the crowning glory of his achievements. It is intimated that he will then, and not until then, retire from the field of his activities, in which he has played so conspicuous a role.