COTTON 
261 
given, and the price we will say is now twelve cents. 
But how will this advance in price affect that re- 
ceived for the usual crop ? It will cause it to ad- 
vance also and meet the new scale in price. 
It may happen that there are men enough and 
equipment sufficient to produce not only the nor- 
mal quantity but enough to handle additional acres 
as well. When the call comes for more cotton it 
may not be met, since all lands that pay at the ten- 
cent rate are growing it already. What happens? 
The intensity of the demand will control. If it 
is insisted upon, the grower will supply it through 
heavier applications of fertilizers and through 
increased acreage. But at what price shall he 
sell it? He may sell it at the same price as he 
has heretofore been selling. But if that grown on 
good soil in previous years was produced and sold 
for ten cents per pound, which in every sense was a 
reasonable rate, then if he now sells this increased 
product at the old price, — a product that costs him 
more to produce since the yield is less and expense 
more — he will sell the increased product at less 
than cost, thereby losing in the enterprise. 
To meet this condition brought about by opening 
up new lands, the grower will have to take from 
his normal and usual crop, returns to make good 
the deficiency of the new. This the wise man will 
not do. On the other hand, this follows in practice : 
Since more cotton is wanted, and since other acres 
are not so profitable, in order to get the same profit 
for the additional land as that received on other 
lands before the enlarged demand came, every 
grower will expect more per pound. 
But the producing power of land does not govern 
price — only directs it; it is the commodity itself 
that fixes values, hence if twelve cents is paid for 
