,9 



ing its value. The trees had, therefore, to be constantly watched, 

 and the amount of labour required to collect the crop rendered the 

 speculation unprofitable. The failure was attributed to peculiarity 

 of climate, but it seems rather to have been owing to peculiarity of 

 the perennial variety of cotton, which is liable to flower in tropical 

 climates at all seasons of the year. This variety has long ceased 

 to be cultivated as a staple product, on this very account. Former- 

 ly it appears to have been the only known species, if it can be so 

 c alled, for the annual variety now cultivated in the United States 

 a nd elsewhere was orginally a perennial. 



A similar state of affairs may be witnessed in our immediate 

 neighbourhood. Cotton is cultivated as a perennial in every island 

 of the Archipelago as far to the eastward as New Guinea, but never 

 with a view to a crop. The plants are scattered about the gardens 

 of the natives, and are visited daily by members of the family to 

 collect any pods that may have opened, ft is only in Java, Bali, 

 and Palembang (the latter was colonized from Java) that cotton is 

 planted as an annual, and singularly enough these are the only 

 countries that produced it in sufficient quantities to form an article 

 of export, or of large domestic consumption, 



The introduction of the annual variety in Java was also the re- 

 sult of necessity. The inhabitants of the plains had no means of 

 growing cotton except on their rice lands, which are flooded during 

 a portion of the year. The seeds are sown in June, after the rice 

 crop has been gathered, and in November the lands are flooded 

 and the plants destroyed, so that only four clear months are allowed 

 for the collection of the crop from the time the seed is sown. Yet 

 it is believed that more cotton is thus grown in Java than in all the 

 other islands of the Archipelago put together. 



When we find this useful plant adapting itself so readily to cir- 

 cumstances, are we to suppose that the Straits Settlements, so 

 highly favoured by nature, are 'denied participation in the fleecy 

 harvest. It would be treason to think so until the annual variety 

 has been tried and failed. The dry season which ended with last 

 month (October) has surely been sufficiently decided for the col- 

 lection of a cotton crop, and we have the authority of the Editor of 

 this Journal (vol. II p. 112) to prove that this is in the ordinary 

 course of events at Singapore. I submit that if seeds of the four- 

 months-blowing Sea Island or " Black Seed " cotton are planted in 

 any eligible spot in Singapore during the months of November to 

 February inclusive, there is no peculiarity in the seasons here to 

 prevent a full crop bring gathered during the ensuing summer 

 months. 



Rain may fall occasionally, but only in showers, and not in greater 

 abundance than on the coast of Florida and Alabama during the 

 cropping season. In October the plants must be uprooted, and the 

 land prepared for fresh seed, and now comes the difficulty that has 

 hitherto prevented the introduction of the liner descriptions of cot- 

 ton in countries within the tropic. The plant is still in full bearing, 



