48 Cotton and its Cultivation. [Sess. 



of the crop elsewhere. As we proceed you will notice that 

 wherever cotton is grown successfully labour is plentiful and 

 cheap. That is a sine qud non of successful cotton-planting. 

 The crop is not one demanding excessive labour in its cul- 

 tivation, but the gathering of it is tedious, and no machine 

 has yet been developed to replace human hands. One man 

 can cultivate about twenty acres, but a family cannot pick it. 

 Another feature you will notice is that not only is labour 

 plentiful and cheap where cotton is grown, but it is gener- 

 ally servile. I don't know about the labour in Eussian Asia, 

 — elsewhere it is certainly servile, — but in Central Asia 

 cultivation is carried on under special Government patronage, 

 and is commercially more or less an experiment. 



In Japan cotton has long been grown, but now in greatly 

 decreased and decreasing quantity. When Japan was closed 

 to commerce and had no railways and no mills, it was used 

 locally, being grown and spun at home. The opening of the 

 country to commerce and the establishment of large mills 

 is, curiously enough, the cause of the decrease in home-grown 

 cotton, Japanese native cotton has a coarse short staple, and 

 the higher quality of the staple of Indian and American 

 cotton is preferred. Japan now uses over 700,000 bales of 

 imported cotton, and runs over 1,000,000 spindles. 



In Eussian Central Asia about 85,000 bales of cotton, 

 weighing 500 lb. each, are grown. The whole product is 

 used in Eussian mills. As I have already remarked, the 

 cultivation is fostered by the Government — I have no doubt, 

 partly to provide traffic for the Trans-Caspian Eailway. This 

 cotton is grown under irrigation. 



The crop of British India is very important, although little 

 of it reaches our islands. The land under cultivation in India 

 is about 15,000,000 acres in extent, and the crop amounts to 

 about 2,750,000 bales, weighing 400 lb. each. Indian ex- 

 ports to Europe are decreasing, and will possibly stop alto- 

 gether before long. For this there are several reasons. The 

 establishment of mills in Bombay, Calcutta, and other places 

 has caused the home consumption of cotton to rise to about 

 1,700,000 bales annually, while a new market for raw cotton 

 in China and Japan takes 600,000 bales. Europe only takes 

 about 300,000 bales and this chiefly continental, only a 



