TOO USEFUL MACHETES.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 222, 19 September 1929, Page 24

TOO USEFUL MACHETES.

A PUZZLE IN CUBA. PROHIBITORY STATUTES. Efforts of the rural police to enforce terms of the law making illegal the possession or carrying of large or small machetes, that indispensable agricultural implement used by virtually every guajiro in Cuba, has resulted in great confusion, according to complaints made by authorities to the Department of the Interior. The machete, a long knife, ranging from twenty to thirty-six inches, is used by the country people of Cuba principally for cutting and trimming sugar cane. It is also used to cut pathways through tropical jungles, butchering and for culinary purposes. T' ,c machete also is used as a weapon of offence and defence, hence the law making the possession of it a criminal offence. Authorities in the rural districts, attempting to enforce the law, confiscated the machetes of every guajiro entering village limits. The guajiro, deprived of his principal agricultural implement, protested that without the machete he was unable to obtain a livelihood. The Department of the Interior has solved the problem by issuing a decree making it legal for countrymen to carry machetes of all types except thoso known as the "cross machetes"—which, because of the foil protecting the wielder's hand, are used by the Cuban army forces and are well adapted to hand-to-hand fighting.