A reproduction of the original book published in 1902. Coffee planting; a short treatise compiled with special reference to the conditions of culture in Cuba and Porto Rico. I'm sitting here enjoying a steaming hot cup of coffee. I don't know anything about where it came from, other than the coffee aisle at my corner Whole Foods grocery store. This coffee is delicious, dark, rich, and giving a slight coffee buzz. Yeah, coffee! I know in theory coffee comes from the coffee bean, it is roasted, ground up, yadeeyaya...but like so many things in our disposable instant culture I don't know much about the history of coffee or how it came to be cultivated and sold to us. Some people discovered it, packaged it and have been selling coffee to us ever since.... but who discovered coffee in Puerto Rico and Cuba? Who decided to grow, harvest and sell the tiny potent coffee bean? In order to heal my ignorance about the history of coffee and how little coffee beans are turned into my yummy cup of coffee, I discovered a short treatise from the turn of the century called COFFEE PLANTING: A SHORT TREATISE originally published in 1902. Here's a little of the books coffee bean flavor for you. "Coffee planting; a short treatise compiled with special reference to the conditions of culture in Cuba and Porto Rico. FEW more profitable openings exist for the introduction of capital and the application ot well directed energy than are to be found in the skilled cultivation, on scientific principles, of coffee plantations in these tropical neighbours of the United States. In Cuba, there are said to have been, in 1847, no less than 2,064 plantations under culture with coffee; and the annual crop, notwithstanding the thriftless system of cultivation then existing, amounted to about 50,000,000 pounds annually. From that date the production rapidly declined, and in the last decades of the past century Cuba imported a large proportion of her consumption of coffee from Porto Rico. During the same period, the cultivation of coffee in Porto Rico increased, but it still remains capable of great expansion on extensive tracts, now almost unproductive, on the hills and in the valleys of the table lands. The coffee of Porto Rico is distinguished by its high quality, although hitherto it has chiefly found appreciation in the markets of France, Italy and Spain. Of the coffee of Cuba, it may be said that it responds to careful culture and preparation by a richness of flavour and capacity for heavy yields unsurpassed in any other West India Island or in South America." COFFEE PLANTING: A SHORT TREATISE originally published in 1902 tells the history of coffee planting in Puerto Rico (or as they spell it Porto Rico) and Cuba. It has been a good start in my coffee education. I'm interested now in reading about coffee cultivation around the globe. Enjoy this cool little book with a hot cup of coffee! This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.