182 



THE AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 



June 4, 1904. 



COTTON NOTES. 



Recent Sales of Barbados Cotton. 



The following particulars have been furnished by 

 the Secretary of the British Cotton Growing Associa- 

 tion in respect of the sales of Barbados cotton shipped 

 from that island from February G to March 26 last: — 



(1) 19 bales shi[ii>ed \>er S.S. 'Darien' and advised in 

 yoiir letter of February 6. All tbis is .sold ; the 16 bales of 

 Sea Island at ]6d. to 16i<7. and the 3 bales of Egyptian at 

 8^d. A report on this lot was sent to you on April 14. 

 The net proceeds were £242 4s. .3(/. 



(2) 14 bales shipped per S.S 'Wanderer' and advised 

 in your letter of Fcbiuary 19. All this cotton is sold; 

 13 bales of .Sea Island at 16^(?. and the 1 bale of Egyptian 

 (Xo. 27) at 8J<7. I enclose valuation of this shipment. The 

 net proceeds of this consignment were £220 16.s. Gd. 



(3) 41 bales of cotton and 9 bags of .seed shipped per 

 S.S. 'La Plata' and advised in your letter of February 27. 

 All this cotton is .sold ; the 36 bales of Sea Island at I5d. to 

 16i</. and the 5 bales of the Egyiitian at S^d. The seed is 

 unsold. A report on tins consignment was forwarded to 

 you on April 12. The net proceeds were £62-5 lO.s-. Sd. 



(4) 43 bales of cotton and 17 bags of seed shipped per 

 S.S. 'Tagus' and advised in your letter of March 12. All 

 this cotton is sold with the exception of No. 98 ; the 34 

 bales of Sea Island sold at 14(/. to 16i</. and the 9 bales of 

 Egj'ptian at S'-^d. A report on this .shipment was forwarded 

 to you on April 12. It realized net £669 5s. id. 



(.5) 40 bales and 2 bags of cotton and 20 bags of seed 

 shipped per S.S. ' Atrato' and advised in your letter of March 

 26. All the cotton is .sold : the Sea Lslaiid at 16</. to Wld. 

 and 3 bales of Egyptian at 8f(/. The 2 bags of native 

 cotton have been sold at 8-^</. Valuation and report on this 

 shipment are enclosed herewith. 



55,105 ft have been crushed, and 12,284 lb. belonging [irinci- 

 pally til i)easant proprieturs, have been shipjied. 



Thu tiital exjiunses til (late, including the money advanced 

 til small priiprietiirs, are £'417 •J". The oust uf crushing the seed 

 at tic. per KX) ft. is £G 17.s. !•'/. 



Since the beginning uf the pve.Sfnt ginning season 241 bales 

 and 5 bags uf ciittun hiive been delivered. Of the bales 2.30 

 have been sliipped and 11 delivered tu the owners or their 

 agents, while the 5 bags have been shipped Of the hales 

 shipped 200 were of Sea Island, 28 of Egjptian, one of Upland 

 and one of mixed Sea Island and I'pland cotton, and three of 

 the Ijags were Sea Island and two of cotton obtained from 

 native plants. 



There is at piesent in the faetory in small i|uantities belong- 

 ing to difi'erent peoi)le sutticient cotton to make about C bales 

 These small lots will be kept until the owners send in moreseed- 

 cotton, when they will be baled along with the new lots of lint. 

 There are also at ]>resent 79 liags of seed-cotton in the faetm-y 

 waiting to be ginned as soon as sufhcient is received to keep 

 the factory going fur two or three days. 



Of the cotton sliipjied account sales have been received for 

 117 bales, realizing £1,760. 



Details as to the result of these shipments will be 

 found elsewhere on this page. 



Barbados Cotton Industry. 



The following report from the Cotton Committee 

 of the Barbados Agricultural Society was handed in at 

 the regular meeting of the Society held on May 28 : — 



The cimnnittee ajipointed at a meeting of the Society held 

 on February 0, liKCi, to co-operate with the Imperial Dejiait- 

 ment of Agriculture fur the West Indies in its endeavour to 

 establish a cotton and onion industry in Barbados, begs tu submit 

 the following interim report on the cotton industiy. Later on, 

 when the cotton season is over, the cotton shipped and the 

 proceeds divided, the Cunniiittee trusts to be in a position to 

 present a fidler report, giving <i short history of the movement 

 from its inception, together with a detailed account of the 

 working of the factory, the total cotton ginned, etc. 



After extensive additions had been made to the faetoiy 

 towards the close of last and the beginning of this year, the 

 Central Cotton Factory was re-opened by his Excellency the 

 Governor on Monday, Janu.iry 25 last. 



Shortly before the cumiiletion of the factoiy, Mr. Seabrook 

 the ginning expert who had been engaged by the Imperial 

 Ciaamissioner of Agriculture specially in connexion with the 

 cottiin factuiy at .St. Mncent, arrived in Barbados un his way 

 tu that island, and .Sir Daiuel Morris was good enough to iiUow 

 him to remain in this colony for a fortnight .so as to render 

 as.sistance in setting the gins and explaining genendly how 

 cotton fact^iries should be ei|ui|iped and run. 



From the time the factory was started in January to the 

 ju'esent time 225,224 Hi. of seed-cotton have been giiuied, 

 yielding 04,9011 ft. or 2882 per cent, of lint, and 1.5(i,000 ft. of 

 seed ; the loss during ginning amounted to ;l,32.5 ft. or nearly lA 

 per cent, of the total weight of seed-cotton. ( )f the seed 



Upland Cotton. 



The following article on the cultivation of 

 Ujdand cotton in the We.sfc Indies is taken from the 

 Barbados Ailvocah". — 



A writer in the Voice of St. Lucia pleads for the 

 cultivation of Upland instead of Sea Island cotton in 

 St. Lucia. The latter, he says, reipiire.s to be treated as 

 a hot house jilant, and although it may bring double the 

 price of Upland, it is too expensive to cultivate. He argues 

 that St. Lucia should continue to cultivate Upland and go 

 on experimenting with Sea Island. The question is purely 

 a commercial one. If the good folk of St. Lucia can 

 establish a better paying industry by growing Lapland cotton 

 than by cultivating Sea Island, they would be silly not to do 

 so. But the}' can hardly expect the Imperial Dejiartincnt of 

 Agriculture to advise and assist them in growing the inferior 

 though hardier plant, when the results of the Department's 

 investigations all point to the inadvisability of such a course. 

 At the present high market rate, there is a bare possibility 

 that any other than the liest lint might pay the cost of cultiva- 

 tion in the West Indies and leave a margin of protit. But 

 the cotton industry of these colonies is not intended to meet 

 a temporarily inflated market. Unless it can hold its own 

 when prices get back to their normal level, the money and 

 time s[ient on its estalilishment would be wasted. There is 

 abundant evidence that in the near future the supply of 

 cotton will have once more overtaken the demand, and in 

 that case the prospects of I'liland cotton becondng a remuner- 

 ative West Indian indu.stry are not likely to be .specially 

 roseate. It is because Sir Daniel Morris is working for the 

 future as well as for the inunediate present, that he counsels 

 cotton growers to concentrate their energies on the cultiva- 

 tion of the Sea Island variety. That the experimenter will 

 meet setbacks iu the initial stages of the establishment of 

 an industry is only what is to be expected ; but such 

 ditticultie.s are seldom regarded as sufhcient to justify the 

 abandonment of the enterprise, uidess it was entered on as 

 a mere sjieculation without regard to the history of the plant 

 or the suitability of .soil and climate to its adaptation. The 

 vast amount of literature on cotton issued periodically by 

 the -\gricultural Department shows how carefully that part 

 of the question has been gone into, and how .solid are the 

 grounds on which the Connnissioner liases his reasons for 



