IS THE COTTON WORM INDIGENOUS? 17 



crop iii Maryland, Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia for many years 

 previous to the Revolution. In a " History of Virginia, by a Native and 

 Inhabitant of the Place," published in 1722, we find that cotton was 

 grown in that colony at least 130 years before the Revolution. In Car- 

 roll's Historical Collections of South Carolina many references are made 

 to the early culture of cotton. The writer of a pamphlet on U A Brief 

 Description of the Province of Carolina and the Coast of Florida," 

 published in 1666, mentions the fact that at the Cape Fear settlements 

 they grew "indico, tobacco, very good, and catton-wwl." In the same 

 collection is found Dr. Hewitt's early account of Georgia and South 

 Carolina, in which he alludes to cotton particularly, and describes the 

 method of planting. 



He says that cotton, " though not of importance enough to have occu- 

 pied the whole attention of the colonists, might, nevertheless, in con- 

 junction with other staples, have been rendered profitable and useful." 



"In Wilson's account of the 'Province of Carolina in America,' pub- 

 lished in 1682, it is stated that l cotton of the Cyprus and Malta sort 

 grows well and a good plenty of the seed is sent thither.' In Peter 

 Parry's description of the Province of Carolina, drawn up in Charleston 

 in 1731, ' flax and cotton' are said to ' thrive admirably.'" * Cotton began 

 to be exported toward the middle of the 18th century. In 1748 Charles- 

 town exported 7 bags of cotton- wool, and in 1754 an additional quantity 

 was shipped. Various quantities were exported up to the time of th 

 Revolution, and during the war for Independence much of the country 

 was supplied with home-grown, home-manufactured cotton cloths. In- 

 stances could be multiplied without number, but are unnecessary to our 

 purpose. In 1786 the celebrated Sea Island cotton was introduced into 

 Georgia from the Bahamas (Long Island and Exuma), to which place 

 it had been brought in 1785 from Anguilla, an island in the Carib Sea,t 

 and this seems to have been the point from which the first great exten- 

 sion of the cultivation of cotton in America dates. 



The first appearance of the cotton-worm in this country now on 

 record was in 1793 in Georgia and South Carolina, after cotton had been 

 grown for 150 years. This certainly would seem to indicate the intro- 

 duction of the worm at that time or shortly previous. 



In Louisiana and Mississippi the evidence on this point seems to be 

 more conclusive j for, if the testimony of the early navigators is to be 

 believed, cotton is indigenous around the mouth of the Mississippi. J 



The plant was probably first cultivated by the early French colonists 



* Memoir on the Cotton Plant. W. E. Seabrook. Charleston, 1844. 



t Ure's Hist, of Cotton Manufacture, I, 150. 



| "Even as far north as the Meschacebe, or Mississippi, the early explorers of that 

 river and its tributary streams saw 'cotton growing wild in the codd, and in great 

 plenty.'" Seabrook's Memoir, p. 5. 



Respecting this statement of Seabrook's, however, Dr. Asa Gray writes: "I know 

 of no authority whatever for indigenous Gossyp'mm on the Mississippi, nor for its cul- 

 ture there before European settlement. I doubt if there is any." 



2 c I 



