PROCEEDINGS OF THE BOLL WEEVIL CONVENTION. 9 



them up and carried them across, or whether some Mexican greaser 

 packed them up and carried them into Texas, when he went to pick cot- 

 ton, is not known, and in all probability never will be. 



"Now, how does the weevil come into a community? Let me tell you 

 how it appeared in Texas. After a dozen or more false specimens are 

 brought in town by anxious farmers, finally a real weevil is brought in. 

 The farm from which this specimen came is watched with a great deal 

 of solicitude by the business men of the town. 



WE HAVE NEVER YET TRIED TO BLOCK OUT 



a farm or infected place. Familiarity with the habits of the weevil 

 explains this. We have to look over the field with a microscope, a tele- 

 scope, and comb the field with a fine-toothed comb before we can find the 

 boil weevil, and it may be that while we are watching and examining one 

 rield another two miles away may be full of them. 



"However it happened, for two years the cotton crop continued to grow 

 less. The farms have difficulty in securing tenants, and have to reduce 

 their rent; the merchants extend time on the land, and when the time 

 comes around they are unable to meet their obligations and have to give 

 up their holdings; and as a result of this state of things, men dropping 

 out of business in every direction, you will find certain towns in well 

 established boll weevil regions that have decreased as to volume of busi- 

 ness fully 50 per cent, in the past four years. In order that this may not 

 come about in your own fair State, this shrinking of towns and dwind- 

 ling of resources, you must recognize, gentlemen of Louisiana, the fact 

 that cotton is the basic principle in all interests of the South. 



"Let me call to your attention the cotton production by counties of 

 certain portions of Texas for the past few years in regions in which the 

 boll weevil has become established. Travis County in 1899 produced 60,- 

 ooo bales of cotton, in 1900, 71,000; in 1901, 40,994, and in 1902, 28,382. 

 Reduced more than half in these four years. Fayette produced in 1899 

 73,238; in 1902, 31,200 bales. Washington in 1899 produced 49>7Qi> in 

 1902, 19,532. 



"These are typical counties. The figures are not yet in for these coun- 

 ties for 1903. Ellis County, which stood first in all the world for produc- 

 tion of cotton, and Navajo County, which stood third, have fallen far, far 

 down in the list. The boll weevil has been in them for a number of 

 years. You can see the destruction to the business interests of 

 Texas that has been wrought, and will continue unless the 

 methods suggested by the United States Government are fully 

 and generally carried out. But the ordinary farmer is a very hard 

 person to influence, and to induce him to turn his old methods inside out, 

 as it will be necessary to do, is an extremely difficult task. 



