THE COTTON INDUSTRY IN BRAZIL. 669 



tliree years. The smooth, black seeds of the crioido * cling so 

 firmly to each other that they separate only when pressed very 

 strongly between the fingers, and the fiber can be stripped from 

 them without their being separated and without leaving any lint 

 upon them. The cotton, when ripe, clings firmly and compactly 

 within the boll, and it is for this reason more difiicult to pick. 



The variety known as the quehradinlio is distinguished from 

 the preceding by having seeds which readily separate from each 

 other. The seeds are fewer in number and the bolls smaller than 

 in the crioido. Both of these varieties, and the yellow variety 

 m.entioned below, are known as " tree cotton." One occasionally 

 hears of tree cotton lasting from five to ten years ; but, while this 

 may be literally true, the crops borne by these old plants are 

 hardly worth the picking. 



The herbaceous variety (called lierhaceo) is an annual plant, 

 growing from three to five feet high, and is identical with that 

 generally cultivated in the United States. The seeds separate in 

 the bolls, and the ripe cotton hangs from them in large flocks. 

 This si^ecies produces more fiber, sometimes from five to six times 

 as much as either of the preceding kinds, but the quality is con- 

 sidered much inferior. The yield on a given piece of ground of 

 the herbaceous cotton is four times as large as that of tree cotton, 

 and in picking one can gather twice as much from the herbaceous 

 in a given time. Herbaceous cotton is said to have been intro- 

 duced from the United States, and there is no doubt about its 

 having been taken to Brazil within a comparatively short period. 



The only other variety deserving attention is the yellow or 

 light brown, which, however, is not grown in any considerable 

 quantities, owing undoubtedly to its color and to Its small yield 

 of fiber. The color is not generally considered an attractive one, 

 but it is valued for certain household articles, such as hammocks, 

 in which neutral tints and fast colors are desirable. 



Cultivation.— Substantially the same system of cultivation 

 is used to-day that was in vogue three hundred years ago. 

 Auguste de Saint-Hilare wrote in 1812, " All the planter has to 

 do is to burn off the woods and plant his seed at the proper sea- 

 son." This is the whole story. There is no uprooting of stumps, 

 no digging out of sprouts, no breaking up with the plow, no 

 preparation of the soil, no laying out of furrows, no cultivation 

 other than the occasional chopping out with the hoe of weeds or 

 sprouts. 



Rotation of crops is almost entirely unknown. Fields are sel- 

 dom laid out with any definite forms, as they would be if the 



* This variety takes its name frojii the black color of the seeds, the word crioulo being 

 Bometimes applied to negroes in Brazil. 



