178 



three or four months, the plants are cleaned the second time ; and both 

 the stem ai d branches pruned, or, as it is called, topped; an inch (or 

 more if the plants are luxuriant) being broke off from the end of each 

 shoot; which is done in order to make the stems throw out a greater 

 number of lateral branches. This operation, if the growth be over 

 luxuriant, is sometimes performed a second, and even a third time. 

 At the end of five months, the plant begins to blossom and put forth, 

 its beautiful yellow flowers, and in two months more, the pod is formed. 

 From the seventh to the tenth month the p ds ripen in succession ; 

 when they burst open in three partitions, displaying their white and 

 glossy down to the sight. The wool is now gathered, the seeds being 

 enveloped in it , from which it is afterwards extricated by a machine 

 resembling a turner's lathe. It is called a gin, and is composed of two 

 small rollers placed close and parallel to each other in a frame, and 

 turned in opposite directions by different wheels, which are moved by 

 the foot. The cotton being put by the hand to these rollers as they 

 move round, readily passes between them, leaving the seeds, which are 

 too large for the interspace behind. The wool is afterwards hand- 

 picked, that it may be properly cleared of decayed leaves, broken seeds, 

 and wool which has been stained and broken in the pod. It is then 

 packed into bags of about two hundred pounds weight, and sent to 

 market. 



If the land is extraordinarily good, four and even five annual crops 

 are sometimes gathered from the same original plants ; after which, 

 instead of replanting, it is not uncommon to cut the cotton bushes 

 down to within three or four inches of the ground, and mould the stems 

 in the May rains, and treat them afterwards in the same manner as 

 plants. Some labour is undoubtedly saved by this practice, but in 

 nine cases out of ten, it will be found more profitable to resort to fresh 

 land every third or fourth year. I consider, at the same time, land to 

 be fresh enough which has lain fallow, or been used in a different line 

 of culture for three or four years together, the great intention of 

 changing the land being to get rid of that peculiar sort of grub or 

 worm which preys on the cotton plants. 



In Jamaica it is commonly reckoned that one acre of cottou will 

 yield annually 150 pounds weight, and in some years nearly twice as 

 much ; but I am afraid that, on an average of any considerable num- 

 ber of successive crops, even the former is too great an allowance. 



By accounts which I have procured from the Bahama islands, it ap- 

 pears, that in 1785, 1786, and 1787 (all of which years were considered 

 as favourable), the produce of the cotton-lands, on an average, did not 

 exceed one hundred and twelve pounds per acre, viz. : — 



In 1785—2,476) (2,480) 



1786— 3,050 Ucres produced «J 3,000 VCwt. of Cotton. 



1787— 4,500 J (4,380 J 



II. — By Dr. James Macfadten. 

 Extract from The Flora of Jamaica, 1837. 

 At present there is no cotton grown in this island for the purpose 

 of exportation. At one time, however, it ^was an important article of 

 cultivation. Ihe cotton shrub grows best in a light soil, especially in 



