282 



WILD AND CULTIVATED COTTONS 



Hybrids. 



Degenera- 

 tion. 



Improve- 

 ment. 



yellow petals having purple claws, and (d) by the seeds being naked 

 instead of possessing a fuzz. The plant thus named polycarpum by 

 Todaro has, therefore, to be regarded as one of the more distinctive culti- 

 vated races of var. maritima. So again the transition into the Long 

 Staple Upland cottons (e.g. Allen, &c., pp. 284-5) from the Sea Islands 

 is often so gradual that the line of separation is sometimes difficult to 

 draw. It has been freely admitted by most writers that the Sea 

 Island cottons readily hybridise with the Uplands, but in every case 

 of this nature hitherto recorded the seeds are stated to have become 

 fuzzy, thus manifesting either the greater dominance of that character 

 or the reappearance of a condition from an ancient stock, brought 

 into prominence through the exhibition of a botanically remote 

 influence. The rapidity with which Sea Island cotton degenerates 

 may also be due to the same circumstance namely, the ease with 

 which the conditions supervene of the ancestor more directly suited 

 to the new environment. 



Improvement of Stock. The care that has been bestowed in the 

 selection and development of the races of this particular form of 

 cotton is illustrative of some of the best systems of cotton improve- 

 ment generally. It would unfortunately, however, take too much 

 space to give more than one or two examples. Mr. Herbert 

 J. Webber, Physiologist in charge of the Laboratory of Plant Breed- 

 ing, under the Department of Agriculture in the United States, 

 has devoted much attention to this subject, and his numerous papers 

 that have appeared in the ' Bulletins of the Bureau of Plant Industry ' 

 and other publications of the United States of America will richly 

 repay perusal. As illustrative of the methods pursued and the 

 results obtained, mention may be made of the special race known as 

 Seabrook. the Seabrook. This appeared in James Island about 1891, and was 

 subsequently improved by Mr. F. P. Seabrook, after whom it was 

 named. The method of selection employed was that pursued by 

 most growers of Sea Island cotton. Several of the best plants 

 observed in a field are marked and watched during their growth. 

 They are picked separately and registered. The seed cotton of each 

 is weighed, and the proportion of the lint after ginning next 

 carefully recorded. They are then critically tested as to length, fine- 

 ness, strength, colour, softness, seed-covering and uniformity of 

 staple. The seed from the plant that answers best to all these 

 tests is retained and the others rejected. That seed is next season 

 planted by itself, and usually about 500 plants are obtained from the 



Method of 

 selection. 



