72 COTTON 
bales with one handling at the gin may be com- 
pressed tightly enough for export purposes; just 
as a fortune awaits the man who will invent a 
roller gin for upland cotton or any other econom- 
ical plan by which the present wastes and the 
barbarous laceration of the fiber may be obviated. 
With American inventive talent put to this task, 
we may hope before many years to stop this drain 
on the wealth of the cotton farmer. 
MARKETING AND EXPORTING THE CROP 
Another waste in former days was in marketing 
the crop, but here there has been in recent years a 
marvellous gain in directness and economy. For- 
merly the farmer sold to his merchant at the county 
seat; the merchant at the county seat sold to the 
commission merchant at the State capital; the 
commission merchant sold to the dealer at the 
seaport; the seaport dealer sold to the New York 
exporter; the New York exporter sold to Liverpool, 
and Liverpool sold to Manchester. Now all this 
is changed —how greatly changed will be seen from 
the report of a cotton exporting house which 
handles more than 300,000 bales each season. 
“The cotton is now bought on the plantations or 
at the railway stations throughout the whole 
Cotton Belt by the representatives of large exporting 
houses and by the mills,” said the manager of this 
house to us the other day. “Our firm employs 
more than 100 buyers for this purpose, and the 
cotton is shipped daily to the port where it is 
expeditiously sampled, classified, weighed, com- 
pressed and loaded upon ships for foreign ports 
with almost incredible swiftness. We have had a 
train loaded with cotton fifty miles from port at 
7 a.m., and at 7 p.m. of the same day it has been 
