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 processes was not of a nature to make one think with much satisfaction of clayed sugar as an ingredient of food, but the inhabitants of the island are superior to such prejudices, and use it with as little scruple as they who do not know in what manner it is made.

In the afternoon we returned to the dwelling of our American host, and taking the train at Caobas, or Mahogany Trees—­so called from the former growth of that tree on the spot—­we were at Matanzas an hour afterward.  The next morning the train brought us to this little town, situated half-way between Matanzas and Havana, but a considerable distance to the south of either.

Letter XLIX.

Negroes in Cuba.—­Indian Slaves.

Havana, April 22, 1849.

The other day when we were at Guines, we heard that a negro was to suffer death early the next morning by the garrote, an instrument by which the neck of the criminal is broken and life extinguished in an instant.  I asked our landlady for what crime the man had been condemned.

“He has killed his master,” she replied, “an old man, in his bed.”

“Had he received any provocation?”

“Not that I have heard; but another slave is to be put to death by the garrote in about a fortnight, whose offense had some palliation.  His master was a man of harsh temper, and treated his slaves with extreme severity; the negro watched his opportunity, and shot him as he sat at table.”