PLANTS CULTIVATED FOR THEIE SEEDS. 405 



into a single locality— in Greece, for instance. It was 

 afterwards propagated on the shores of the Mediterranean 

 by the Arabs, as we see from the name qutn or kwtn} 

 which has passed into the modern languages of the south 

 of Europe as cotone, coton, algodon. Eben el Awan, of 

 Seville, who lived in the twelfth century, describes 'its 

 cultivation as it was practised in his time in Sicily, 

 Spain, and the East.^ 



Gossypium herbaceum is the species most cultivated 

 in the United States.^ It was probably introduced 

 there frocj Europe. It was a new cultivation a hundred 

 years ago, for a bale of North American cotton was 

 confiscated at Liverpool in 1774, on the plea that the 

 cotton-plant did not grow there.* The silky cotton {sea 

 island) is another species, American, of which I shall 

 presently speak. 



Tree-Cotton — Gossypium arboreum, Linnaeus. 



This species is taller and of longer duration than the 

 herbaceous cotton; the lobes of the leaf are narrower, 

 the bracts less divided or entire. The flower is usually 

 pink, with a red centre. The cotton is always white. 



According to Anglo-Indian botanists, this is not, as 

 it was supposed, an Indian species, and is even rarely 

 cultivated in India. It is a native of tropical Africa. 

 It has been seen wild in Upper Guinea, in Abyssinia, 

 Sennaar, and Upper Egypt.* So great a number of 

 collectors have brought it from these countries, that 

 there is no room for doubt; but cultivation has so diffused 

 and mixed this species with others that it has been 

 described under several names in works on Southern 

 Asia. 



' It 1b impoBsible not to remark the resemblance between this name 

 and that of flax in Arabic, Icattan or kittan; it is an example of the oon- 

 fnsion which takes place in names where there is an analogy between 

 the prodacts. , 



* De Lasteyrie, Dm Cotonnier, p. 290. _ 



* Torrey and Asa Gray, Flora of North America, i. p. 230 ; Darling- 

 ton, Agricultwral Sotam/, p. 16. 



* Schonw, Natursehilderungen, p. 152. - t, -^ t j 



' Masters, in Oliver, n. Trap. Afr.,i. p. 211 ; Hooker, ^- of Brit. I«d, 

 i.p. 347; Sohweinfurth and Ascherson, Aufzdhlung, p. 265 (under the 

 name Gossypium nigrum) ; Parlatore, Specie del Ootorn, p. 25. 



