110 COTTON 



owner's ability to help it. High pedigree, if one 

 may use this term in this connection, counts for 

 little, if a poor farmer owns the land. Just as the 

 canvas reveals the training and the power of the 

 artist, so the cotton soil testifies as to the intelligence 

 and skill of the owner. 



THE SUPREME TEST OF THE PLANTER 



Power to make the soil produce remunerative 

 crops is the supreme test of cotton farming. With- 

 out this power, good prices for the staple, an ideal 

 climate or situation, a propitious season, are of as 

 little agricultural value as "sounding brass or 

 tinkling cymbals." 



What then is needed ? 



This is needed: Knowledge of the soil and its 

 management. The cotton farmer must so know 

 his soil and its proper management that he can 

 make it yield better crops ; that he can permanently 

 improve it for the generations that are to come after 

 him; that he can make not two, but five pounds of 

 lint or seed grow where one grew before. These 

 happy ends can be achieved only by the most in- 

 telligent cultivation, and by the application of every 

 principle of improvement revealed by modern 

 science. 



HELPING NATURE 



The soil we know was once rock. Through 

 countless years this primitive rock has been dis- 

 integrating and making soil. The great forces of 

 nature through ages and ages of recurring summer 

 and winter have been at work on it. And soil build- 

 ing never stops. Our cotton soils are being made 

 to-day. But you must help nature in her effort to 

 make your own soil more productive. You must 



