COTTON 33 



is as unsatisfactory in quality as it is deficient in 

 quantity. None of the countries mentioned, he 

 says, have a congenial climate such as ours. The 

 Indian fiber is "short, rough and unsuited to any 

 but the coarsest fabrics;" the Chinese fiber he found 

 "only about a quarter of an inch long;" the cotton 

 from West Africa "wholly unfit for use as a sub- 

 stitute for America;" and he did not think Peru or 

 Brazil could compete with the South. Summing 

 up, Mr. Atkinson declared that while he should 

 like to believe otherwise, he was forced to the con- 

 clusion that the South would have a virtual monopo- 

 ly for fifty years. "There is but one section of the 

 earth's surface, where, in my judgment, there can 

 be competition with our Cotton States in growing 

 cotton of equal quality, and that is on the high 

 pampas of the Paraguay and Parana Rivers, suf- 

 ficiently elevated to be free from tropical condi- 

 tions, endowed with a soil of wonderful fertility and 

 capable of unlimited crops of cotton and wheat 



Therefore our Cotton States have an 



unwholesome but practical monopoly of the cotton 

 of commerce. They are not, therefore, under the 

 wholesome stimulus of prospective want, and there- 

 fore their method as a rule, subject to conspicuous 

 exceptions, in dealing with their land, their cotton 

 and their cotton bale, is as bad as it can be, as I have 

 often said when face to face with my friends in the 

 South." 



ENGLISH AUTHORITIES FINALLY ADMIT THE SOUTH^S 

 SUPREMACY 



Lastly I come to the most striking testimony of 

 all direct evidence given by "our friends, the ene- 

 my." It is the report of the Commissioners sent 



