236 COTTON IN THE MADRAS PKESIDENOT. [CHAP. TI. 



Native spinners, the seed popularly supposed to be un- 

 fit for cattle, and the market doubtful and distant. 

 High prices on the spot would extend the cultivation 

 of Indian Cotton, and perhaps promote the cultivation 

 of American Cotton ; but this is a question for the con- 

 sideration, not of Grovernment, but of the merchant and 

 manufacturer. 

 372 2nd, Indian Cotton may be improved, but only to a 

 degree. — This inference, though it amounts to a con- 

 viction, is not so distinctly proved as the previous pro- 

 position. It has been stated that at one time the Cot- 

 ton of India was of a finer quality than it is in the 

 present day. This may be readily believed. In the 

 olden time, when Indian manufactured goods were in 

 large demand, the Native manufacturers purchased the 

 raw material upon the spot, and the prices varied ac- 

 cording to quality. Thus the profit of the grower de- 

 pended upon the quality of the wool, and more attention 

 was naturally paid to the cultivation of the plant and 

 cleanliness of the staple. Up to this point, and by means 

 of a similar stimulus, the Indigenous Cotton may be 

 improved in the present day, but no further. As a re- 

 Economist cent writer in a London paper has remarked, 

 25th Jan., the Indigenous Cotton is the product of an 

 Indian soil and climate, just as New Orleans 

 is the product of an American soil and climate. The 

 same writer also states that New Orleans Cotton grown 

 in India has a tendency to degenerate, and to approx- 

 imate year by year to the Indigenous article. To this 

 it may be added that the Bourbon Cotton of the present 

 day can scarcely be of the same quality as it was forty 

 years ago, when " Hughes Tinnevelly Cotton " was 

 quoted at high prices in the Liverpool market. Indeed, 

 it might be inferred that the crop is more or less pre- 

 carious in proportion to the difierence between the ex- 

 otic plant and the Indigenous article. Accordingly it 

 seems to be very nearly proved, that whilst an improved 

 quality of the Indigenous Cotton can be produced with 

 profit to the Eyot by a little more care in the selection 

 of seed, in the cultivation of the plant, and in the clean- 

 liness of the staple, — the soil and climate of Southern 



