Chapter VII: Appendix: I

ANCIENT MANUFACTURE OF COCOA.

Most of the operations described are only the performance on a large scale by modern machinery of those employed by the Mexicans, and by those who learned from them, of whom we read:

"For this purpose they have a broad, smooth stone, well
polished or glazed very hard, and being made fit in all
respects for their use, they grind the cacaos thereon very
small, and when they have so done, they have another broad
stone ready, under which they keep a gentle fire.

"A more speedy way for the making up of the cacao into
chocolate is this: They have a mill made in the form of some
kind of malt-mills, whose stones are firm and hard, which work
by turning, and upon this mill are ground the cacaos grossly,
and then between other stones they work that which is ground
yet smaller, or else by beating it up in a mortar bring it into
the usual form."

A later writer remarks of this process:

"The Indians, from whom we borrow it, are not very nice in
doing it; they roast the kernels in earthen pots, then free
them from their skins, and afterwards crush and grind them
between two stones, and so form cakes of it with their hands."

And, further on, in speaking of the Spaniards' mode of preparation, he says:

"They put them (the kernels) into a large mortar to reduce them
to a gross powder, which they afterwards grind upon a stone.
They make choice of a stone which naturally resists the fire,
from sixteen to eighteen inches broad, and about twenty-seven
or thirty long and three in thickness, and hollowed in the
middle about one inch and a half deep. Under this they place a
pan of coals to heat the stone, so that the heat makes it easy
for the iron roller to make it so fine as to leave neither lump
nor the least hardness."

At the present day, when the beans are plentiful on the cacao estates, but no machines for manufacture exist, the planters prepare a palatable drink by roasting the beans on a moving shovel or pan over the open fire, husking them by the time-honoured plan of tossing in the breeze, and grinding out on a flat stone in much the same manner as did the old Spaniards. The writer has even seen a little tobacco-press ingeniously adapted for the purpose of extracting the butter, the invention of Mr. J.H. Hart, of the Trinidad Botanical Gardens, a gentleman who has done much in the direction of investigating the best cacao for seed, and the most favourable methods of cultivation.