\ 



April — sept. 1858.] Oil of Cotton Seed. 121 



burgh ; the latter has doubtless been obtained without the inter- 

 vention of this agent, for I do not find in it the indication which 

 characterizes oils that are the result of the action of fire upon 

 resins. — Pharmaceutical Journal, Vol. 16, p. 332. 



Mr. Wayne on the Oil of Cotton Seed. 



The great quantity of cotton produced in India and the little 

 use made of the seed, save as food for cattle, give value to the 

 following notice of the practice, in America, of extracting an oil 

 from the seed : — 



" The manufacture of oil from cotton seed is not a novelty ; a 

 small quantity has been made at the South for some years past ; 

 lately, however, the demand for lubricators has turned the atten- 

 tion of many to the cotton seed (immense quantities of which are 

 allowed to rot, or used only as manure upon the cotton fields of 

 the South) as a material from which large quantities of oil might 

 be profitably obtained. 



" At New Orleans I have been informed that a quantity of this 

 oil has been of late produced, a sample of which I have seen. It 

 was very bland, light coloured oil, said to be made by steaming 

 the seeds and collecting the oil by skimming it from the surface 

 of the water. I cannot vouch for the correctness of the above 

 process. 



" In Cincinnati some of the oil millers have made the attempt 

 of pressing cotton seed for the oil, but the experiments so far, I 

 believe, have been unsatisfactory, both in regard to the quality of 

 the oil obtained and in the cost of it. 



" The oil, to be made profitably, should either be manufactured 

 in the vicinity of the cotton plantation, as the seeds from the at- 

 tached fibre are bulky, and the cost of transportation an item ; or 

 the seed should be hulled at the spot and shipped to the place 

 where it is to be pressed in that condition, as it requires three or 

 four bushels of seed in the wool to produce one bushel of hulled 

 seed ready for the mill. 

 Vol. xx. o. 8. Vol. it. n. s. 



