102 COTTON CULTUEE. 



soils, the custom has been to plant six, eight, or ten times 

 as many seeds as were expected to become plants. In 

 other words, of the twelve hundred pounds of seed taken 

 from an acre, a thousand pounds were returned to the soil 

 as a fertilizer ; so the real removal was only six hundred 

 pounds from an acre, that is, as compared with the pota- 

 to, six to twenty-five, or about one-fourth. 



The preservation and restoration of cotton lands de- 

 pends on two practices, one mechanical, the other chemi- 

 cal ; the former involving no expense other than a little 

 well directed labor, the latter the restoration of a few 

 pounds of potash, lime and phosphorus, to each acre 

 from which a crop has been taken. 



Of the two, probably the former is as important as the 

 latter ; on hill lands very much more so. 



Under these two heads the subject will be considered. 



First. Circle plowing and ditching. 



Second. The nature and amount of fertilizers required 

 by cotton. 



Several circumstances conspire to make the deterioration 

 of upland cotton soils by washing very great. In the first 

 place, the cotton soils are all soft, light, and porous, " as 

 mellow as an ash-heap." In a natural state, they are kept 

 in place by the roots of the trees,. leaves, and the tough 

 cane roots, and fallen canes, which are the natural growth 

 of that climate and soil. 



When all these are removed by clearing and the plow, 

 what should keep the mould from being carried by the 

 washing of copious rains down the sharp hill-sides, and 

 swept away into the swollen streams ? 



Consider, also, that the requirements of cotton call for 

 frequent plowing and hoeing ; so that all weeds and grass 

 are destroyed, and no little roots remain to hold the sur- 

 face in a sod. The cotton root is small and smooth, going 

 directly down into the subsoil. Nor is the surface of the 

 country locked up from the abrasion of the rain, by those 



