AGRICULTURAL MECHANICS AND RURAL ECONOMY. 23 



table, where one woman motes for two ginners. If a mashed seed is found, the ginner is called 

 to pick it out. From the moter's table, the cotton goes to the overlooker's table, who sees 

 that every mote is picked out. Then it goes to the packer's room, and thence in suitable 

 weather into the bags. It is packed by hand, three hundred and sixty pounds in a bag made 

 of four and one-half yards of cloth. One bag is a day's work, the packer standing in the bag 

 and beating down the cotton with a rammer, almost as solid as though pressed with a screw. 



' ' Human ingenuity has been taxed heavily to furnish a cotton-gin that would clean Sea- 

 Island cotton at a more rapid rate, without injuring the delicate, silky fibre of this variety, 

 which is used for all the very finest threads, either for weaving or sewing. 



"A great many sanguine inventors have satisfied themselves that they had accomplished 

 this very desirable object, by inventing a gin that could be worked by other than human 

 power, ginning faster than the roller-gin, without injuring the staple, but they have never 

 been able to convince the Sea-Island planters. Governor Seabrook spent $5000 in experi- 

 ments, and others equally as much, to get a substitute, but have been compelled to go back to 

 the little primitive machine we have described. 



"We have often been assured by the cultivators of this description of cotton, that any man 

 who could contrive an expeditious method of ginning their crops, could readily get assurances 

 of $500,000 for his invention, as soon as he could procure certificates from the spinners that 

 cotton cleaned upon his machine was equal to that upon those now in use. Various attempts 

 have been made with horse-power and steam-power to relieve the hard labor of propelling the 

 roller-gins with the foot, but even this had to be abandoned on account of seeds being drawn 

 through and broken with the lint. Even a substitute for the wooden rollers would be worth 

 thousands of dollars. Those in use have to be made of wood not hard enough to glaze, or 

 soft enough to broom ; and, with all care in selecting the right quality, a pair of rollers wear 

 out every day, and sometimes have to be renewed two or three times a day. These rollers 

 must be split out and made smooth with the grain by a knife ; the more rapid process of the 

 turning-lathe will not answer. 



"In conclusion, we put the pertinent question to American inventors : Have you or not in- 

 genuity enough to make a Sea-Island cotton-gin ? If you cannot produce the entire article, can 

 younot find a substitute for the wooden rollers, which continually wear out?" — New York Tribune. 



Rafting Cotton. 



Mr. G. R. Griffith, of Washington, District of Columbia, has recently perfected an invention 

 by which cotton may be got to market and the seaboard in spite of low water in the Southern 

 rivers. The plan is very simple, being merely the adoption of a kind of vulcanized India- 

 rubber bag, so constructed that any number of them may be connected together in the fashion 

 of a raft, and either towed down the shallow streams by a steamer of light draught, or piloted 

 by hands on the cotton, two men being able to manage one hundred bales. Twelve inches of 

 water is amply sufficient for the transportation of cotton by means of these patent floaters ; 

 and if they can be successfully introduced, the condition of the streams hereafter will be no 

 barrier to supplying the markets with the great Southern staple. 



Cotton Rigging for Ships. 



This article continues to increase in popular favor. The New Orleans Delta states, " that 

 in April last there were thirteen large vessels in that port with a part or the whole of their 

 running rigging and hawsers of cotton cordage. The officers of all these ships were unani- 

 mous in their testimony in favor of cotton cordage for running rigging, and many of them 

 thought it would be adopted for standing also. A large new clipper vessel, recently built at 

 Newburyport, Massachusetts, has all her rigging, both standing and running, of cotton 

 cordage. An experienced sea-captain, in an article in the Delta, asserts that cotton rope is 

 much stronger than Manilla, as by bending cotton and Manilla ropes together and heaving on 

 it at the capstan the Manilla will always part first. In wet weather, likewise, it is more 

 pliable, and in frosty weather it is not so stiff as Manilla. After it is used a few months it 

 becomes smooth and glossy, and works through the blocks much better than any other rope. 



