THE COTTON PLANT 97 
does not merely connote the spinning and manufacture, 
but the growing of cotton as well. 
The first of these attempts was directed to the forma- 
tion of a department in the University of Manchester, 
at the time of the British Association’s visit in 1915, 
but it was a little too far in advance of public opinion. 
Subsequently the Department of Scientific and Indus- 
trial Research took the initiative, and a Provisional 
Cotton Research Committee has undertaken to formu- 
late a suitable project for the purpose. 
In any attempt to evaluate the potential importance 
of such research to the Empire, it should be remembered 
that the inventive genius of Wyatt, Paul, Hargreaves, 
Crompton, and Arkwright made England the original 
home of mechanical cotton-spinning. That some of 
the adventitious results of their genius are not entirely 
commendable is beside the point ; the brains of these 
men contributed largely to create our modern prosperity. 
Subsequently we lost much of this initial supremacy as 
other countries learned how to spin for themselves, but 
we naturally retained a superiority, in the form of 
finer spinning than our pupils and competitors. Never- 
theless, though Lancashire possesses certain natural 
advantages, some of these are less important than they 
were in the past, and after a certain time it is inevitable 
that the product of our rivals will approach or even 
surpass our own if we do not exert ourselves to regain 
our initial lead, by scientific study of our industry from 
the cotton-field to the factory, and by a renewed deep- 
seated inventiveness. 
It will be seen from the preceding account that there 
is no lack of material for study, and we may hope that 
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