ANSWERS TO CIRCULAR NO. 7. 
[89] 
San Antonio, Tex.. September 29, 1?79. 
You do uot agree with my theory, but it will bother you to nnd out where the Cot- 
ton Worm came from, under the circumstances, as stated in my previous letter. 
There is no cotton growing wUA in the part of Mexico where I resided, as there lire 
heavy frosts there every winter; in the tropical region of the State of Vera Cruz, and 
to the south large crops of cotton are raised, but I never saw a wild cotton plant. 
The consul at Vera Cruz could, I have no doubt, give you an interesting account 
of the cotton plant in his section. I know that in the neighborhood of Paso del 
Macho, on the Vera Cruz Railroad, the cotton is bent down so as to stand the storms, 
and consequently the plant grows horizontally instead of perpendicular, and presents 
a curious appearance when ready to pick. 
Some years ago there were large tields of cotton in the State of Coahuila, in the 
district of Mouclova, but although admirably adapted to the production, the Cotton 
Worm from successive visitations entirely broke up the business, and now no cotton 
ifl planted in that State. 
I planted cotton for four yean on the Rio Nazas, or laguua country, in the State of 
DnrangO. This is the Nile of America. The Nazas rises periodically (always once a 
year, sometimes oftener >. and overflows a vast extent of country : a bold, clear mount- 
ain stream, 200 miles long, finally emerges from the mountains into an immense plain. 
The hunks become lower as the river descends, until by many mouths it winds its 
way into the lake or laguua, a body of water 90 miles long and 3o wide, with no out- 
let—a great body of froth water on an elevation of, say, 3,000 feet, in the midst of a 
great dry desert. The water of the lake is not utilized, as the soil on its banks is 
poor, no alluvial deposit or growth denoting original formation, but rather that the 
lake had been produced there l»y some couvulsion of nature, as, if it were theorigiual 
deposit of the waters of this great river, there would be swamps and sluices and timber 
denoting that fact, as the mouths of the Red River and other streams in Texas and 
Louisiana. The haciendas of the lagunu begin where the River Nazas emerges from 
the mountains, and is utilized by dams and canals and ditches, by which the over- 
flow is restrained and the land irrigated. This irrigation is seldom need more than 
once a year, as the extraordinary character of the alluvium deposit of centuries re- 
tains moisture sufficient to produce crops for t wo year- if necessary. (It seldom rains, 
and rain is not depended on at all for crops.) 
Cotton is plauted once in seven years: is planted with a hoe. A hole is dug from 
IS to 18 inches deep, to the moisture, the seed deposited, and that is the start, which 
is expensive, but there is no other way, as the moisture is too low down to be reached 
by a plow. The cultivation is a> with us: Frosts kill the plants, the stalks are 
cleared off and burned, and in the early spring, with the budding of the peach tree, 
the cotton sprouts, ami gives you a start of three or four weeks over seed just planted. 
The ''Plant a'* gives the beat yield the third year; gives less, but a good crop, the 
fourth and tilth : and then produces as in the first and second years. The seed plauted 
is the black seed, like the Sea Island and Egyptian; staple long and tine. The green 
seed, or American cotton seed, yields the first year better than the black seed will on 
the third year, hut as that seed will not rat toon or grow again from the roots, and the 
expense of planting is so great.it is not generally used. Cotton produces a bale to 
the acre; corn and wheat most extraordinary crops in these rich alluvials. 
Cotton is plauted at Santa Rosalie, in the State of Chihuahua, but not to a great 
extent; the climate is almost too cold. This gives you all the information I have about 
the cotton region. With t he exception of the Nazas and the Santa Rosalie, no cotton 
is grown in Mexico, except in the tropical regions of the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, 
as the rest of Mexico is generally table-land, with an altitude of from H,000 to 7,000 
feet, and a temperature too low for delicate vegetation. 
There is a mountain in the center of this vast alluvial plain of the laguua. In 
caves in this mountain are to-day the bodies of an extinct race of Indians, of whose 
existence in this plain there is no history extant. The bodies or mummies I have 
seen; they are wrapped in a species of cloth or mattiug made from the maguez, 
paiuted, and all in good preservation: the skin has dried, the hair is perfect: all in 
wonderful preservation. No iron, gold, silver, or other metal has been found in the 
cave. Pottery ware, of the same shape as the pictures we see of the old Egyptians, 
arrow-heads, and spear-heads of lliut. It really is remarkable, and induces the belief 
that some sudden overflow of the river submerged the plaiu and drowned all the peo- 
ple ; they were evidently used to high water, as they buried their dead in the caves 
of the high mountains. There are thousands of mummies in these caves. Excuse 
this long letter. 
Yours, respectfully, 
H. P. BEE. 
Prof. C. V. Riley, Chief U. & E. C. 
