CHAPTER XXVIII. 
STATISTICS: HOW THE WORLD WATCHES WHILE THE 
PLANT GROWS 
There is a reason why statistics of production 
and consumption of cotton should be made accu- 
rately, completely, and frequently. Trade has be- 
come so complex since the advent of the Cotton 
Exchange—because of the rapid developments of 
re-selling on close margins, taking advantage of 
fluctuations in prices and dealing in futures; and 
using unnatural influences to fix prices by manipu- 
lators—that every one interested has come to rec- 
ognize the need of some strong disinterested agency 
to make reports of actual facts so that all concerned 
may be better guided as how to buy or sell. 
The producer, the merchant, the speculator, and 
the consumer must ever be informed as to the 
movement of the law of supply and demand, that 
the market of neither the raw product nor the 
finished material, may be congested or overloaded. 
Let this happen, and not only that form of cotton 
immediately concerned, but all humanity, will suf- 
fer in consequence of the abnormal condition. 
The hope lies in publicity—complete and accurate. 
These reports must be made by disinterested par- 
ties: not by the speculator who reports a bearish 
condition of the market that prices may be de- 
pressed, trying to favor his own operations; nor 
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