178 THE COTTON PLANT IN EGYPT chap. 



achieved, on a crop which is worth twenty to thirty 

 millions of pounds per annum. 



Concurrently with the depreciation of yield, there had 

 also been a depreciation of quality in the chief variety 

 grown."' '*' ^^ This latter trouble was partly due to the 

 same cause, but chiefly to varietal " deterioration." 



The coincidence was extremely unfortunate, for the 

 short crops led to inflated prices,* which were intolerable 

 with a degrading quality.; the consumers, driven to 

 experiment with inferior cottons, succeeded beyond all 

 expectation in the substitution of long-staple Upland, and 

 even of ordinary Upland, for Egyptian cotton. The 

 typical Egyptian cotton has thus lost the monopoly which 

 it formerly enjoyed. 



The remedies for these two troubles are now being 

 applied, t to wit, drainage and restricted irrigation in the 

 first case, together with the supply of better seed in the 

 second. With regard to seed-supply we have seen that 

 the problem is essentially the avoidance of natural crossing, 

 since " deterioration " must ensue if a single foreign 

 pollen-grain enters the pedigree. By cultivating pure 

 lines in bee-proof cages, propagating from these in 

 isolated sites, or in plots protected by related populations, 

 and by renewing continually the seed-supply of any 

 strain in this way from the laboratory through seed-farms, 

 the varieties of the future will be proof against " deteriora- 

 tion," unless mutation takes place. It cannot be too 

 strongly insisted upon, that any scheme for the intro- 

 duction of new cottons is doomed to ultimate failure unless 

 continual replacement of contaminated stocks is taking 

 place every year from the original pure strain. °' ^^ 



The demands of Egyptian cotton upon the cotton- 

 breeder,®- ''' ^^ apart from this question of purifying and 



* Todd, J. A. 



t Lord Kitcliener's Report on Egypt and the Sudan, 1912. 



