207 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



COTTON. 



\ in a zing rise of the Cotton Manufactory, unparalleled in the Annals of Commerce— 

 Tlie Cotton Plants — Their culture in the Confederate States and in India — 

 Prospects of Cotton cultivation in India — Brazilian and Egyptian Cotton — 

 Prospects held forth by Africa — Cotton-seed Oil. 



FTNDER the Plantagenets and the Tudors, wool formed the 

 U chief export of England. The pastoral races that in- 

 habited the British Isles, unskilled in weaving, suffered the 

 nore industrious Flemings to convert their fleeces into tissues ; 

 Buid the dominions of the Duke of Burgundy, enriched by manu- 

 factures and by the stimulus they gave to agriculture, became 

 the most prosperous part of Europe. At length the islanders 

 began to discover the sources of the wealth which rendered 

 Grhent and Bruges, Ypres and Louvain, the marvel and envy of 

 the mediaeval world ; and gradually learning to keep their wool 

 at home, invited the Flemings to the shores of England. 



Sir Walter Raleigh wrote three centuries ago that the greatest 

 question of the hour was, " Shall we export our great staple to 

 enrich Flanders, or weave it at home ? " The bigoted oppression 

 of Spain came in aid to the more enlightened policy of England : 

 wool ceased to be the chief of our exports, and English cloth 

 was now sent abroad in place of the unwrought material. Since 

 this beneficial change, although the devotion of land to pasturage, 

 increased capital, and the cultivation of green crops, have greatly 

 multiplied English flocks and fleeces, the domestic supply has 

 proved insufficient. Drafts have been made on Spain, Saxony, 

 and the Levant ; the merino sheep has been naturalised in 

 Australia and at the Cape ; and England, in addition to her own 

 vast produce, now annually imports at least 150,000,000 pounds 

 of wool. 



But in spite of this wonderful growth, the wool-manufactory 



j 



