SECTION IV: VAR. MARITIMA 281 



Varieties and Races. The Sea Island plant may accordingly be Baces. 

 spoken of as embracing all the higher grade cottons of G. barbadense, 

 the lower grades being the more typical conditions (botanically) of 

 the species. The isolation of G. vitifolium I regard as a matter of con- 

 venience, commercially and historically, but of the greatest possible 

 uncertainty botanically. In fact it seems highly probable that the 

 plant recognised by me as G. vitifolium may have been the original 

 stock, and G. barbadense, Linn, (more especially G. maritimum, 

 Tod.), the perfected and final development as a cultivated plant. The 

 hesitation of the early botanists to admit G. barbadense and the Ambi- 

 ambiguity that prevailed (and still prevails) regarding it, seems at 8 

 all events to favour this view. What originated the higher grade Sea 

 Island cottons I am unable to say for certain, but would not be 

 at all surprised, as already suggested, were they proved by actual 

 experiment to be hybrids of G. barbadense (or G. vitifolium) X Hybrid. 

 G. brasiliense in time improved and perfected by selection. The best 

 stock was apparently produced comparatively quite recently (and 

 perhaps unintentionally) in the moist insular and tropical climate 

 of the West Indies or of the American Sea Islands. 



I much regret that the material at my disposal does not admit of ciassifi- 

 my attempting a classification and description of the various forms catl im " 

 of the Sea Island cotton. Most of my correspondents have described 

 the plants grown by them as in no respect differing from the well- 

 known types of the islands of Georgia and Carolina. Indeed, in 

 many cases the admission is made of their stock having been 

 obtained therefrom. A glance at the illustrations furnished by me 

 (Plates Nos. 46, 47 and 48) will, however, suffice to show that there 

 is a considerable range in form which, while not so great perhaps as 

 under G. mexicanum, is still none the less extensive and valuable. 



Under G. mexicanum mention will be found to have been made 

 (p. 232) to a condition in which lateral shoots are suppressed, thus 

 bringing three or four flowers into an axillary cluster. This has 

 been described as the Cluster and Semi-Cluster cottons, of which Cluster 

 Chaco, Welborn and Willet's Bed Leaf are perhaps the best known co ons ' 

 examples. But a clustered condition is by no means confined to the 

 Upland cottons : it occurs also among the Sea Islands. Todaro has 

 figured an example of this nature in his G. maritimum, var. poly- 

 carpum (cf. ' Eelaz. Cult, dei Cot.,' 226, t. vin.) which thus differs 

 from the corresponding cluster cottons of G. mexicanum by being (a) 

 glabrous or nearly so, (b) by having deeply 5-lobed leaves, (c) by the 



