In the matter of popular beverages it is somewhat interesting to note that in each hemisphere, nature provided trees of the forest, the fruit of which for countless centuries has furnished to man beverages that today are almost as essential as food. In fact the Cacao of the western hemisphere is a very nutritious food and drink at the same time. While coffee is indigenous to Arabia and Abyssinia, whence the trees have been carried into nearly all parts of the tropical world, cacao, on the other hand, was indigenous to the West Indies, to Mexico, Central America and probably to all countries bordering on the Caribbean. The shores of the latter great sea or basin of the ocean, with their rich warm valleys formed by the rivers tributary to it, are the natural home of the cacoa, botanically known as Theobroma, or food of the gods. When Cortez forced himself as an unwelcome guest upon Montezuma, in the first quarter of the sixteenth century, he found a delicious drink called caca-huatl, made by the Aztecs from the seeds of this really marvellous plant. The taste of chocolate is so delicate and so palatable that fondness for the drink does not have to be acquired in any country. From the West Indies cacao, or cocoa beans, were carried to Spain and the cultivation of the plant was introduced into the warmer latitudes of the eastern hemisphere. The government of Spain, with its short-sighted greed of those days, succeeded in keeping the manufacture of this drink more or less secret from the outside world, and for chocolate demanded prices so high that only the rich could afford to buy it, retarding thus its general use in Europe for nearly a century. The consumption of chocolate today, both as a beverage and as a food, especially in the manufacture of confections, has assumed throughout the world very large proportions. Approximately 150,000,000 pounds of chocolate and cocoa produced from the cacao trees of the Caribbean basin are consumed in civilized countries, while the demand for the beans is increasing by rapid bounds every year. There is perhaps no form of nutritious food more condensed and complete than that of the better grade of chocolate. Nine-tenths of the content of this wonderful bean are assimilated by the system, hence its value not only to travelers but also to armies and forces in the field, who demand condensed foods like chocolate, with a large amount of nourishment in a very small bulk. An analysis of cacao yields of carbohydrates, 37%; of fat, 29%; and of protein, 22%. In the better grades of chocolate, used for both food and drink, there is practically no waste. From the above it may be readily seen that the cultivation of cacao, from which the chocolate and cocoa of commerce are derived, has become one of the standard agricultural industries of the world, and one which for the future gives great promise, since the demand for the cacao beans is increasing rapidly, as is also the market price.