MEADE COTTON REPLACING SEA ISLAND. 19 
The following paragraphs on seed selection appear in a pamphlet 
sent out by the United States Department of Agriculture (8) with 
the distribution of seed : 
Unless selection is continued, the value of a variety is sure to decline. A 
well-bred variety is superior to ordinary unselected cotton not only in having 
better plants, but in having the plants more nearly alike. Whether selection has 
any power to make better plants is a question, but there can be no doubt of the 
power of selection to keep the plants alike. Even in the best and most carefully 
selected stocks inferior plants will appear, and if these are allowed to multiply 
and cross with the others the stock is sure to deteriorate. The pollen from the 
flowers of inferior plants is carried about by bees and other insects, and the 
seeds developed from such pollen transmit the characters of the inferior parent. 
Even if they do not come into expression in the first generation they are likely 
' to appear in the second generation. 
To grow cotton from unselected seed involves the same kind of losses as in an 
orchard planted with unselected seedling apple trees. Less cotton is produced 
and the quality is also inferior. The higher the quality of the cotton the more 
stringent is the requirement of a uniform staple. Unless the fibers have the 
same length and strength they can not be spun into fine threads or woven into 
strong fabrics. (PI. IX.) 
PEESEEVATION OF VARIETIES BY SELECTION. 
The method of selection to be followed in preserving a variety from deteriora- 
tion is entirely different from that employed in the development of new varieties. 
The breeder of new varieties seeks for exceptional individuals and prefers those 
that are unlike any variety previously known. If the selection is being carried 
on to preserve a variety, the object is not to secure seed from the peculiar plants, 
but to reject all that deviate from the characters of the variety. The first 
qualification for such selection is a familiarity with the habits of growth and 
other characters of the variety, to enable the farmer or breeder to confine his 
selection to the plants that adhere to the form or type of the variety and to re- 
ject all that vary from the type. Most of the latter would prove to be very 
inferior and at the same time would increase the diversity of the variety and 
hasten its degeneration. 
IMPROVED METHODS OF FIELD SELECTION. 
No matter how good a new variety may be or how carefully it may have 
been bred and selected, inferior plants are likely to appear, especially when it 
is grown under new and unaccustomed conditions. A special effort is being 
made to limit the distribution to seed from uniform fields of cotton, but selec- 
tion is necessary to keep any variety from deterioration, and it is inadvisable 
to wait until the deterioration becomes serious before beginning the selection. 
If proper attention be paid to the roguing out of inferior plants in the first 
season there may be much less variation in the second, the variety becoming 
better adjusted to the new conditions. 
As uniformity is one of the first essentials of value in a variety, the behav- 
ior of a new variety in this respect is one of the first things to be noted. Do 
not wait till the crop matures, but watch the plants in the early part of the 
season. Even before the time of flowering it is possible to distinguish " freak " 
plants by differences in their habits of growth or the characters of their stems 
and leaves. Whenever such variations can be detected the plants should be 
pulled out at once in order to prevent the crossing of the good plants with infe- 
