284 
COTTON 
is pressed out, and the other ingredients moulded 
into cakes. 
The operation now required to complete the 
work consists of preparing the crude oil for the 
refinery and the cake for commerce. For con- 
sumption in our country nearly the whole of the 
cake is ground, putting it into a better form both 
for feeding and fertilizing purposes. 
THE SIZE OF MILL 
The cost of transportation and seed storage is 
one disadvantage in the process of manufacturing 
oil and meal. But this difficulty is now overcome 
by the multiplication of small oil mills, — local 
enterprises springing up all over the Cotton Belt 
and each doing the work of its own community. 
And (what is true of few other lines of manufac- 
turing) the small oil mill does the work about as 
efficiently and economically as the large one. 
The small mill in fact has a peculiar advantage 
in that it has the interested support of the farmers 
of the neighborhood. It should be as much a part 
of the community, and should be operated in the 
service of the farmers just as much as is the co- 
operative creamery or the local flour mill in our 
Western States. The community mill will get its 
seed almost entirely from the neighborhood, and 
meal and hulls will, or should be, entirely used by 
the farmers of the community; consequently there 
is no freight to pay on seed or on their products. 
The item of storage is of considerable conse- 
quence, since a chain of delivery can be arranged 
that will keep the mill at work, and not require 
large quantities of seed to be kept on hand at any 
time. 
