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Part VIII
SECTION IV
CIGARS
In 1492, explorers with Columbus discovered natives in
the Cuban jungle who were smoking rolled up tobacco
leaves in the shape of a crude cigar. Although such cigars
were taken to Spain in the I6th century, they were
introduced slowly to the rest of Europe and did not win
popularity in England until the last century; yet the
islands of Cuba and Jamaica have remained the home of the
best cigars to this day. Less good, but acceptable even to
the connoisseur, is the leaf grown in Java, Borneo and
Sumatra in the East Indies, the United States, India,
Japan and South Africa. And to-day, British-made cigars,
which are cheaper because duty is paid only on the
imported leaf and not on the manufactured cigar, are also
of excellent quality. This is partly due to the British
manufacturer's privilege of buying in any of the world's
markets.
Growing and Curing
The tobacco plants are taken from their seed-beds to well
cultivated fields where,in order to produce the finest quality
shadegrown leaf, some are protected from the sun by
screens of fine cloth. After weeks of careful cultivation,
which includes the fighting of pests and diseases and the
topping of each plant so that the leaves achieve
maximum growth, the leaves are picked as they mature,
tied on laths and hung in specially heated"curing"bams'
Later the bunches of "cured" (or dried) leaves, called
hands , are stacked in bulks to begin the long natural
process of sweating or fermentation.
Grading the Leaf
Before marketing, the leaves are sorted for the purposes
for which they are required. First, the small broken leaf
is selected for the "filler" or main body of the cigar.
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