Comjjosition and Nutritive Value of Cotton- Ca/iC. 421 



now be bought according to its quality, at from 6Z. to 8/. per 

 ton, and appears to offer considerable economic advantages to the 

 feeder of stock in comparison with other descriptions of cake. 

 Several agriculturists, who have used it in limited quantity, 

 speak favourably of its nutritive properties, but precise com- 

 parative feeding experiments are yet required before the practical 

 value of cotton-cake, and its relative merits, in comparison with 

 linseed and other descriptions of cake, can be determined with 

 certainty. To my knowledge it is now being tried on a large 

 scale in various parts of this country, and ere long we may hope 

 to obtain the desired information. We shall then be able to 

 ascertain how far the theoretical value of cotton-cake, as deduced 

 from analysis, corresponds with its practical effects on the system. 



This cake is obtained on submitting to strong pressure the 

 oily seeds of the cotton plant (^Gossypium barbadense), which, as 

 is well known, is cultivated extensively in the southern part of 

 the United States, in India, China, the interior of Africa, and 

 other warm climates. 



Cotton-seed yields a dark brown coloured, semi-liquid, and 

 agreeably smelling oil, which, in a purified state, is now used to 

 some extent for the usual purposes for which other kinds of oil 

 and fats are employed. The removal of the dark colour which 

 the oil possesses in a raw state appears to be attended with con- 

 siderable difficulties, which as yet have only been partially over- 

 come. This perhaps will account for the fact that even now 

 large quantities of cotton-seed are annually thrown aside as useless, 

 or are used to some extent as a manure. However the production 

 of cotton-seed oil has been steadily increasing, and large impor- 

 tations into England of cake, chiefly from St. Louis and New 

 Orleans, have been effected during the past season. It may be 

 confidently expected that the practical difficulties that stand in the 

 way of the purification of the oil will soon be removed, and there 

 can be but little doubt that then a constant and large supply of 

 cotton-cake will be furnished to the English feeder of stock. 



The first cargoes of cotton-cake were imported into England 

 some years ago, but the trials of it were not very success- 

 ful. This need not surprise, for the introduction of every new 

 article into the market is beset with difficulties. Perhaps the 

 partial failures that attended the use of the early shipments of 

 cotton - cake arose from the crude methods of preparing it, 

 and the inferior, half-spoiled state in which it was given to 

 animals. Probably the first cargoes that were brought to Eng- 

 land found no immediate purchasers ; the cake had to be 

 warehoused for a considerable length of time, during which 

 it got mouldy by damp air, sour, and unpalatable, before it 

 found its way into the feeding stall. Even now some cotton- 

 cake is so mouldy and sour that it is hardly fit to be given to 



