12 HEARINGS BEFORE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE. 
If much more cotton should be raised in Europe and they go into 
the cotton-seed industry of oil and cake, they will destroy our differ- 
ential, get 2 cents a pound off the price of our cotton, competitively 
speaking, and get an increased impetus, so that really the matter is 
of vast concern; for when we consider that annually, at the present 
rate of bales of cotton raised and the price, $330,000,000 in gold are 
brought from European markets and poured out into the channels of 
American commerce by the fiber alone, and that $30,000,000 is brought 
from various South American countries and the Orient in cotton prod- 
ucts, and about $23,000,000 from the by-products of cotton seed, and 
all of it is poured out in the channels of trade in America annually, 
we see what is threatened and what is at stake. This constitutes one 
of the chief imports that make the great balance of trade in our favor. 
The last section is a verbatim copy of a section in the bill which 
created the Bureau of Animal Industry. Section + is as follows: 
That the Secretary of Agriculture shall report annually to Congress, at the com- 
mencement of each session, a list of the names of all persons employed, an itemized 
statement of all expenditures under this act, and full particulars of the means 
adopted and carried into effect in furtherance of the purposes of this act. 
So that if mistakes are made—and it is human to err—the matter 
can be annually fully looked into by the Committee on Agriculture 
and by the Congress, and whatever amendments are necessary or 
whatever enactment is necessary, in the way of the extension of the 
fund, or anything else, it can be done intelligently and in a business 
way under this bill. 
I do not’ wish to detain the committee, and I thank all of you for 
the close attention you have given me in the matter. If any gentle- 
man desires to interrogate me, I will be very glad to answer him. 
Mr. Hasxins. How long has this boll weevil been devastating your 
crops in Texas? 
Mr. Burcess. Something less than eight years. Its first appearance 
was in what we call the Rio Grande counties in Texas, in the extreme 
southwestern part of the State, and undoubtedly it came from Mexico. 
That has been determined by Doctor Howard’s investigation in the 
Bureau of Entomology of the Department of Agriculture. They have 
chased the bug down and they know all about it. The only trouble is 
they find he is the most marvelously healthy bug and the most difficult 
scoundrel to kill that they have ever run up against in their researches. 
He does not feed on the leaves of the plant. If he did, this legislation 
never would have been sought. We worked on him long ago on that 
theory, but he does not feed on the leaves. He does not feed, even, 
on the leaves of the square; but those of you who are familiar with 
cotton growing will understand when I tell you that this bug comes 
out and he goes in the butt of the square, in under the leaves, and 
bores into the embryo boll, deposits his seed, and then on and attacks 
another square. The effect of that is that the square, which is the first 
process of development of fruit with cotton—the square going into 
the bloom and the bloom into the full-grown boll, something after the 
fashion of other fruits—the effect of that is that the square withers 
dries up, and falls to the ground ina few days. I believe it is fourteen 
days, is it not, Doctor Howard? 
Doctor Howarp. Yes. 
Mr. Burerss. That is the estimate. From the deposit that larva 
hatches out into another boll weevil. 
