13 



ing to his lack of knowledge of the culture, etc., but this 

 did uot check its advauce, for the culture progressed rap- 

 idly in all the parishes. Indigo and rice on upper Santee 

 v.as abandoned, and cotton took their place, which it holds 

 to-da}'. The black seed, or long cotton, of those days was 

 not as 3'ou may suppose the fine staple of to-day, improved 

 by selection, cultivation, etc., but that was of a coarser grade, 

 1 judge, for even in my day there was planted on upper 

 ii^antee a grade of cotton called in the miarket ''Santees," 

 and better staple than common short cotton, perhaps some- 

 thing like the Georgias and Floridas of this time. Origin- 

 ally the cultivation in our parishes of cotton was very 

 slovenly and crude, the seed was by some put in hills five 

 feet square, and by others holes were dug in the 

 ground on the level, some distance apart, four hoeings were 

 considered sufi'icient to make it, the first being a hoeing 

 down or flush process, afterwards it was drawn up. Tlie 

 thinning was done by careful hands, three and a half 

 aci'es the first and four acres the second thinning. Strange 

 as it may seem to you the ploAV was practically unknown, 

 and no uianuring was ever done by these early settlers. 

 The system then was to clear new fields when the old were 

 exhausted. A school boy now knows more about phosphate, 

 nitrogen and potash than those old planters. Seldom more 

 than 100 pounds to the acre was made until nearer plant- 

 ing was later adopted. The preparing of the lint for market 

 was very carelessly done, and consequently badly cleaned, 

 no pains were taken to pick the cotton free from leaves, 

 dirt, etc., and the only process of moting was by whiDpimr 

 it with twigs on the floor after it was sunned; and often 

 the bag contained stained cotton as well as good. The 

 packing was done, as todav. in bass, an old iron axle ivcc 

 or pestle used to beat it in. To r>ack one basr of cotton was 

 r-onsidpred n mnn's dav's work, and a woman onlv sewed un 

 five baos ns her sl'arp. The lint was i^icked from seed bv 

 I'onfl imtil the roller pin camp into use. This was at first 

 n r-lnnitiilv ponstructpd foot p-irt. wbicli servpd its itiivnoso 

 im + il f]io iiiiTiro\'pd pin of tod;iv onmp nloi^o-. Most of fhp 

 nrnn ti'hs tbpn pipnpd bv sTnvps n^tpv tlip task xvovk \vn«! 

 flopp 171 thp pveniups or pnvlv in thp morninp; before thev 



