166 



WILD AND CULTIVATED COTTONS 



Egyptian 

 cottons. 



Jumel's 

 cotton. 



There seems to my mind little or no doubt that G. microcarpum 

 and G. peruvianum are crosses traceable to the fuzzy-seeded cottons of 

 Central and South America as one of their parents. The close 

 association of the last-mentioned plant (G. peruvianum) with Africa 

 and Egypt is at first sight difficult of comprehension. But when it 

 is recollected that an exceedingly plentiful wild and cultivated 

 species (a member of the so-called American fuzzy-seeded cottons) 

 has been known in Africa and Upper Egypt from the most ancient 

 times, viz. G. punctatum, var. nigeria, then the difficulty, I think, 

 disappears. It is thus quite possible that the various states of 

 G. punctatum were crossed with G. barbadense, G. vitifolium, or G. 

 brasiliense, and thus originated special races, as, for example, the so- 

 called G. peruvianum, but a cross of that nature might as easily have 

 occurred in Africa as in Peru. In part support of this opinion, mention 

 may be made of the fact that while repeated efforts have been put forth 

 to acclimatise Sea Island cotton in Egypt, the results have not been so 

 satisfactory as the endeavours (at present engaging the attention of 

 the Egyptian authorities) to improve the so-called Egyptian cottons, 

 the mit afifi, abassi, dc. These are races of G. peruvianum, as accepted 

 by botanists, which might be designated indigenous to Egypt, and are 

 therefore the most hopeful stocks for selection and improvement. 

 The recognised trade differences between South American cotton of 

 this type and Egyptian cotton, may be due, of course, to climate and 

 soil, but there is just the possibility that they are the direct 

 expression of the fact that in the one the fuzzy-seeded ancestor has 

 been var. nigeria, and in the other var. Jamaica. By way of con- 

 cluding these observations on G. peruvianum attention may be 

 drawn to the circumstance that Sloane's specimens of G. brazilianum 

 preserved in the British Museum turn out to be G. peruvianum and 

 not G. brasiliense. This is certainly most curious, and it shows that 

 the plant here dealt with has been known for several centuries. 



So again there would seem every reason to anticipate that 

 G. microcarpum may be established as a hybrid from G. Schottii 

 (or some other allied species) crossed with G. brasiliense. The tree 

 cotton, brought by M. Jumel to lower Egypt in 1822, was, I believe, 

 G. brasiliense, a plant long acclimatised in upper Egypt and Africa, as, 

 for example, at Nyam-Nyam in the Soudan. It is thus highly likely 

 that the repeated appearance in Egypt and Africa of plants that 

 must be classed as G. microcarpum may be the direct consequence 

 of the spontaneous crossing of some indigenous stock (such as var. 



