349 



such water as is rapidly absorbed from the air by artificially dried 

 soil, and can afterwards be expelled only by the application of a high 

 temperature. This water does not render the soil moist to the touch. 

 It can accumulate in a particular soil to a certain extent only, and 

 this limit may be called the point of saturation of the soil. 



4. The soil may be supersaturated, that is to say, liquid water, 

 evident to the senses as such, may mix with the earth and render it, 

 in the common sense of the term, moist or wet. 



Now it would seem that the larger the relative amount of water in 

 the 1st and 3rd of these forms taken up by the cotton plant, and 

 the smaller the quantity received in the 2nd and 4th forms (at least 

 during the greater part of its period of growth), the more favourable 

 will be the result. 



In water-soaked soil, i. e. holding water in the 4th condition men- 

 tioned, cotton will not thrive. The following statements* are borne 

 out by the general experience of planters. "The tap-root of the 



cotton plant will not strike down into wet soil On wet land 



the cotton plant grows small, looks sickly, or scalds in the hot sun, 

 and bears but little raw cotton, and it takes twice the labour to cul- 

 tivate it, as the grass usually grows the faster, and is much more dif- 

 ficult to kill out." Such soil will obviously be benefited by draining. 

 On the other hand, the state of things demanding artificial irrigation 

 very necessary probably in some parts of India would seem to be 

 simply the absence of water in any one of the three other conditions 

 noticed. 



In the early stages of growth the plant receives a moderate supply 

 of rain, t. e. water in the 2nd condition named, with advantage ; 

 but even then heavy rains are very injurious, and later in the season 

 they are absolutely destructive ; the bolls do not open, but fall off, or 

 rot upon the branches a surface growth of grass and weeds accu- 

 mulates so rapidly as to choke the crop the boll worm and other 

 destructive insects make their appearance arid the cotton from bolls 

 already open hangs out in trailing locks, draggled, dirty, and matted 

 together. Dry years are emphatically those of the largest and best 

 crops. 



Yet, like all other plants, cotton must be supplied with moisture ; 



* From the pamphlet ' On the Cultivation of Orleans Staple Cotton,' published 

 by the Manchester Cotton Supply Association, p. 14. 



