280 



WILD AND CULTIVATED COTTONS 



Expert 

 studies. 



Acclimati- by efforts at acclimatisation of the existing stock. Certainly this 

 much is in favour of fresh and independent endeavours being made, 

 in each and every country namely, that the attempts at acclimatisation 

 have not hitherto been satisfactory. Even in the West Indies, where 

 the greatest success has been attained, the results have been by no 

 means uniform : in Barbados and one or two other islands quite as 

 good cotton as that of the Sea Islands of America has been produced, 

 while Jamaica is still reputed to afford a much inferior cotton. So 

 also Egypt, though it does not produce the true Sea Island cotton 

 to any material extent, has by a happy accident found in G. peru- 

 vianum its natural and highly satisfactory long staple. In 1864 Spruce 

 found that Sea Island cotton could not be profitably grown in Peru. 

 (Cf. Spruce, ' Cult, of the Cotton in N. Peru,' p. 69.) 



Principal George F. Foaden, of the School of Agriculture in 

 Egypt, paid a visit (May 1903) to the United States, and published a 

 most valuable report of his studies of long staple cotton which will 

 be found in the ' Journal of the Khedivial Agricultural Society ' (vol. 

 v., pp. 133-78), and in ' Bulletin No. 62 of the Bureau of Plant 

 Industry of the U.S. of America,' issued in 1904. A few months 

 later Sir Daniel Morris and Mr. J. B. Bovell contributed a detailed 

 report of their experiences and conclusions regarding ' Sea Island 

 Cotton,' to the ' West Indian Bulletin ' (vol. iv., pp. 287-374). This 

 was the outcome of an official visit paid (September and October 

 1903) to the Southern United States in order to study the conditions 

 under which Sea Island cotton is there grown. Mr. W. A. Orton, 

 an officer of the Department of Agriculture in the States, was 

 deputed to accompany Sir Daniel and his coadjutor 'to South 

 Carolina and Georgia to explain the various experiments carried 

 on with a view of improving the yield, length and strength of the 

 fibre, resistance to disease, and adaptation to soil and climatic 

 conditions of the Sea Island cotton.' From these two reports we 

 have observations that cover the whole period of the cultivation of 

 the plant and the manipulation of the crop, made by experts well 

 qualified to contrast the systems pursued in the States with their 

 own personal knowledge in other countries. 



Since it is hardly possible in this work to attempt to do more 

 than indicate the chief sources of information, regarding the various 

 species of Gossypium, the reader desirous of recent details of 

 Sea Island cotton can hardly do better than procure these reports of 

 personal study. 



Practical 

 experi- 

 ments. 



