JO Cotton and its Cultivation. [Sess. 



Let us visit a Sea Island plantation in Georgia. The 

 cotton is grown on sandy, low-lying islands, and in a few 

 low-lying flat districts very near the coast. We find the 

 soil very sandy, and, where not cleared, covered with pitch- 

 pine forests. The farmers are of sturdy German build, living 

 generally in good houses built of logs hewn on their own land. 

 Their live-stock consists of horses or mules and little oxen, 

 all small and wiry. The soil is so sandy and easily cultivated 

 that light stock only is necessary. This is a happy coinci- 

 dence, as heavy stock does not do well. They grow oats, 

 maize, and rice for home use, and melons, tomatoes, and 

 vegetables to ship north in spring and early summer. The 

 farmer's main crop is cotton, and he grows the long staple Sea 

 Island variety, for which he gets a price at least twice as large 

 as that brought by the upland variety. Only about 85,000 

 bales of it are raised altogether, and Georgia produces over 

 50,000, or about two-thirds of the whole. Great Britain takes 

 about 24,000 bales of this crop, and I believe the greater part 

 of the British import is spun into thread in Paisley. 



The cotton-gin is a comparatively simple machine. The 

 cotton, with seed firmly attached to it, falls into a trough in 

 front of a sheet of iron. This sheet of iron is nearly upright, 

 and has slits cut in it about an eighth of an inch wide. 

 Behind this sheet of iron there is a shaft with a large number 

 of small circular saws attached at regular intervals. These 

 saws rotate rapidly, and are so placed that they project 

 slightly through the above-mentioned slits. The saws catch 

 the cotton and pull it off the seeds. While the cotton is drawn 

 by the saws through the slits, the seeds are too large to get 

 through. The stoppage of the seeds by the slits gives the 

 resistance necessary for tearing the cotton off. Behind the 

 saws there are rotary brushes revolving more rapidly than the 

 saws, and in the same direction. The brushes take the 

 cotton off the saw-teeth completely, and by a simple device 

 the cotton is removed from the brushes and carried by rollers 

 to the rear of the machine in the shape of a continuous sheet 

 of lint. The press, where it is compressed into bales, is 

 conveniently placed behind the gin, so that the process is 

 continuous, — almost automatic. 



The fineness of cotton yarn is counted by the number of 



