April 1907.] 



209 



FIBRES 



Caravonica Cotton. 



The following letters are of interest, but we adhere to our position that 

 it! is a pity to grow a perennial cotton in Ceylon when annuals fetching a higher 

 price can be well grown and the ground left fallow for a few months to get rid of 



pests. -En. T.A. 



SAMPLES OF CARAVONICA COTTON. 



5th December. 



Sib,— T have the honour to inform you that I am sending you by the Orient 

 Line steamer " Oruba " sailing to-day a box containing samples of Caravonica 

 cotton, at the request of the Hou'ble Mr. H. L. Crawford, CM.G. They are of the 

 ' wool ' and ' silk ' varieties of the Caravonica cotton, and were grown in the North- 

 Western Province by a member of this Society, Mr. J. W. C. de Soysa. 



Mr. de Soysa informs me that he hopes shortly to be in a position to place 

 his cotton on the home market. 



C. H. Brown, Esq., 1 am, Sir, 



Cotton Broker, Liverpool. Your Obedient Servant, 



A. N. GALBRAITH, 

 Secretary, Ceylon Agricultural Society. 



Worthing, 13th January, 1907. 

 Dear Sir, I have received the following letters from Geo. H. Brown & Co., 

 Cotton Brokers, Liverpool, in regard to the samples of cotton forwarded to them 

 at my request : — 



"We have received by the "Oruba" from Colombo two samples described 

 respectively as ivool and silk varieties of Caravonica cotton. The Secretary of the 

 Ceylon Agricultural Society writes that they are the produce of Mr. J. W. C. de 

 Soysa, who hopes shortly to be in a position to place this cotton on the home 

 market. It will be an easy matter to report on the qualities of the cotton in a 

 descriptive way, but valuations of a growth more or less strange as yet to the market 

 here must be rather vague. I may say at once that both samples are of high grade 

 and good staple, and if the bulk is consistent with them, they speak well for the care 

 taken in raising the plant and ginning the cotton picked therefrom. With anything 

 like present market conditions buyers could be readily found for such cotton if 

 brought to port in marketable quantities. 



I then wrote and asked if they could give even an approximate value for the 

 cotton in question, and I received the following reply : — 



" Not to go into fractions the samples of Ceylon cotton are Avorth 9d. a lb., and 

 at to-day's (10th January) general gravity might fetch more if the growth became at 

 all a familiar one in the market, but as you know values are fickle from season to 

 season. Two years ago Middling American was quoted at 3'8d. per lb. To-day it is 

 6 02d. per lb., and what is more, the best sorts of American command a premuiun 

 never known before over the common level, so that lid. or even a shilling per lb. is 

 not to-day an impossible figure for the very best. The current grades of Egyptian 

 fetch lOd. to lid. a lb. These prices are the more remarkable as both the American 

 and Egyptian crops promise to be the largest ever known. On the other hand, the 



