326 TRANSACTIONS OP SECTION K, 



700,000 acres, with the result that the profits to the growers reached a value 

 of nearly one million sterling. 



Leake's research work in the United Provinces, carried on for many years, 

 is regarded as probably the most complete yet attempted with cotton in India. 

 A variety known as K.22 has been widely distributed, and the produce in 1916 

 sold at 31 rupees per maund when local cotton was 25 rupees. Further, the 

 ginning percentage has been raised from 33 to about 40, while the lint is of 

 superior quality. 



Leake has also been successful in raising an early flowering form of cotton 

 on Mendelian lines. The new form differed from ordinary cotton cultivated 

 in the United Provinces in that it assumed a sympodial instead, of a monopodial 

 habit. It not only yielded cotton of high quality, but it was found by its 

 early flowering habit to suit the special conditions of the United Provinces. 



As Egyptian cotton comes next to Sea Island cotton in quality it may be 

 useful to refer to what has been done, or attempted to be done, on scientific 

 lines to safeguard the industry. Its importance .may be gathered from the 

 fact that the area under cultivation is between a million and a-half and two 

 million acres. Balls has fully reviewed the scientific and other problems that 

 had to be solved in placing the industry on a satisfactory footing. 



In the first place, as in ill cotton areas, it had to be realised that it was 

 necessary to produce varieties on pure lines. An attempt to produce crosses 

 between American Upland and Egyptian cotton had to be abandoned. It was 

 then resohed to select strains cf individual Egyptian sorts and by the study of 

 heredity on Mendelian lines to raise new varieties of pure strain. It was 

 hoped by these means aJid by organising an effective system of seed distribu- 

 tion, year by year, to maintain the general purity of the crop. The chief 

 difficulty met with was in respect of the relatively small size of the unit areas 

 and the liability of the pure-strain plants being contaminated by pollen carried 

 by wind or by beej from the neighbouring areas. According to Balls, the high- 

 water mark of Egyptian cotton growing was from 1895 to 1899. Since that 

 time, although the actual area under cotton had been increased by 600,000 acres, 

 the benefit measured in terms of cotton alone was small. It is probable that 

 the attacks of the pink boll worm and other pests may have affected the 

 results, buc Balls and his colleagues came to the conclusion ' that the falling 

 off in yield was due to a rise in the level of the sub-soil water, or water table 

 of the country brought about by the extension of the irrigation system during 

 the past decade.' The roots of the cotton plant were thus adversely affected 

 at a critical period of growth. This recalls what Howard discovered, that one 

 of the causes of the wilt disease in indigo in India was the destruction of 

 the fine roots and nodules during heavy monsoon rains. This shows, as sug- 

 gested by Balls, how small was our real knowledge of the root functions of 

 plants, and in the experiments carried on by him and his colleagues in Egypt 

 they were ' semi-consciously building up a general scientific knowledge of root- 

 function worked out on the cotton plant as our material.' 



Balls, while carrying out numerous investigations bearing on the production 

 of pure strains of Egyptian cotton, devised a method of recording crop-develop- 

 ment by means of illustrative graphs likely to be adopted not only for cotton 

 but other crops. Incidentally, he proved that the close-planting method on 

 ridges adopted by the native cultivators in Egypt was more advantageoiis than 

 the wider planting adopted in the United States and other countries. It is a 

 sign of the times that a British Cotton Industry Research Association has 

 recently been formed at Manchester to promote a wide scheme of research 

 in connection with the production of cotton and its utilisation in industry. 

 It will employ a staff of scientific and skilled workers, and maintain scholar- 

 ships, and eventually a Cotton Research Institute is in contemplation. It also 

 proposes to establish research stations in the cotton-growing portions of the 

 Empire for the investigation of fhe growth of cotton and the careful and com- 

 plete study of the scientific problems that may arise. 



Probably the most remarkable instance on record of the successful combina- 

 tion of science and enterprise in the Tropics is the establishment of a cacao- 

 growing industry in the Colony of the Gold Coast, West Africa. Thirty years 

 ago no cacao of any kind was produced on the Coast. Owing, however, to the 

 foresight of the then Governor (Sir William Brandford Griffith), who sought 



