COTTON FIBRES AND FABRICS. 161 



About six or seven years after their departure, a friend living in New York gave 

 an excellent account of their proceedings. Not only could the old man puff away 



in glorious style, and the son do well as a portrait-painter, but old Mrs. 



had cut a new set of teeth, and her poll was covered with a full crop of dark- 

 brown hair ! " 

 Journal of Mental Science. 



4 



COTTON FIBRES AND FABRICS. 



By Dk. SACC, 



PROFESSOR IN THE ACADEMY OF NEUFCHATEL. 1 



COTTON owes its kingship quite as much to the tenacity with 

 which its fibres adhere to one another, as to their length or fine- 

 ness ; and were it not that the fibre produced by the bombax, or silk- 

 cotton tree, is too smooth, cotton would find in it a powerful rival. 

 Cotton-wool is the downy bed in which the seeds of the cotton-plant 

 are enveloped, and is the product of hot countries. It has several 

 varieties, that cultivated in Algeria and in Southern Europe seldom 

 attaining a height of over twelve inches, while at the equator the plant 

 grows as high as an apple-tree, and bears a fruit twice as large as that 

 of the Algerian species. The cotton grown in the East Indies is of 

 very inferior quality, its fibre being short and hard ; yet it was largely 

 used in manufacture, during the war in the United States. Chinese 

 cotton is yellow, and hence the peculiar color of the fabric called 

 nankeen. 



The cotton-plant is probably a native of Africa, and Livingstone 

 found it in the interior of that country along the banks of all the rivers. 

 The ancient Egyptians doubtless imported from Abyssinia their cotton 

 cloths for mummy-wrappings and for the garments of priests and nobles, 

 and from them the Jews inherited the employment of that texture 

 for the robes of their priests : for, where the Bible makes mention of/me 

 linen, we must read cotton, as flax does not grow in hot climates. 

 From Africa cotton-culture passed into Persia and Georgia ; then into 

 India, and from India into China. In the latter empire all the clothing 

 of the poorer classes is of cotton, of extremely firm texture. Indeed, so 

 strong is the cotton cloth manufactured by the Chinese, that it is im- 

 possible for a man to tear a piece of it across ; and the people of China 

 and India refuse to buy European cotton manufactures, calling them 

 mere spiders' webs. 



If the true aim of prudent industry be to produce good fabrics at 



1 Translated and abridged from the Annates du Genie Civil. Dr. Sacc is the grand- 

 Bon of Dupaaquier, who introduced into Switzerland the English process of printing 

 calico. The author is responsible for his own political economy. 



VOL. II. 11 



