206 
THE PROGRESS OF CULTIVATING COTTON IN INDIA 
entirely. We have thus given the foregoing 
preliminary remarks more with the view of 
shewing the importance of the papers under 
review than of supposing we are enlighten- 
ing the cotton cultivators of the coun- 
try ; but be it understood that a reviewer 
always should, and, in fact, must so feel 
that he is writing for the information 
of those who are ignorant of the subject. 
We shall therefore first look into ad- 
ditional facts, gleaned from the report of 
the Select Committee of both Houses of 
Parliament, as to the cultivation of cot- 
ton ; evidence sufficient to shew that ijy im- 
proved cultivation and by selection of seed, 
the Bombay Cotton could be produced to 
equal or nearly to equal the Sea island cot- 
ton, and therefore that as good and useful 
cotton can be grown in the East Indies 
as in America, and the cotton from this or 
Kidney seed will produce four times the 
quantity which the present growth of 
cotton does, and be much more easily 
cleaned. As to the question of cli- 
mate, the cotton shrub is indigenous 
throughout the peninsula of India, from 
Ceylon in the south, to the foot of the 
Himalayah mountains in the north ; and 
various kinds have long been known to the 
native cultivators, viz. annual, biennial, and 
cotton of several years’ duration; some 
kinds scarcely reach the height of one foot, 
others attain ten or twelve feet, and some a 
still greater height. The species which is in 
cultivation in India is an annual shrub, a 
variety of the green seed kind, yielding a 
white pod. Of this there are subvarieties, of 
some of which the wool is more easily 
separated from the seeds than of others. 
Some of the cotton plants have brown, 
yellow, ash-coloured, and iron-grey pods ; 
the seeds of some species are black, green, 
and red. 
The introduction into India of new and 
better species, and of improved modes of 
preparing cotton for European markets, 
has at various times been attempted. The 
Sea island cotton, Barbadoes cotton, Brazil 
cotton, and Bourbon cotton, both of the 
green seed and black seed varieties, became 
objects of experimental cultivation in vari- 
ous parts of India. Success has not gene- 
rally attended these endeavours ; but we ! 
think this is owing to the little attention 
native cultivators have given to the subject, 
and on account of experiments principally 
on a scale of commercial speculation which 
have been conducted by Europeans having 
been confined to the Bourbon species. The 
objection to the Indian cotton has been 
shortness of staple and of its not being 
sufficiently cleansed from the seeds, leaves, 
and other matters, to remedy which the 
Court of Directors obtained from America 
patterns of the most approved machines in 
use in Georgia and Carolina, for separating 
the wool of the cotton from its seeds ; and 
they also, in the year 1813, engaged the 
services of Mr. Metcalfe, who had for 
some years carried on the business of a 
cleaner of cotton in Georgia, who, after a 
residence of some time in India, finding his 
endeavours to induce the natives to use 
American machines were fruitless, gave up 
his employment. The Marchioness of Has - 
tings procured from England, in the year 
1823, a supply of seeds of the Brazil and 
Barbadoes cotton, which she cultivated at 
Barrackpore, and distributed the seed among 
the husbandmen in the neighbourhood. The 
cotton thus raised was delivered to the 
commercial residents at the factories of 
Santipore and Huripaul, and wrought into 
muslin. Bourbon cotton was cultivated in 
the province of Tinnevelly ; but it appears 
the climate was opposed to the extension of 
the culture. Cotton has been grown to some 
extent in the southern Mahratta country, 
but of an inferior quality to the Guzerat 
cotton. It is supposed that long-stapled 
fine cotton is never grown in any country 
except in the immediate neighbourhood 
of the sea. The cotton of Dacca is grown 
within seventy miles of the sea. The Sea 
island cotton is grown in the immediate 
neighbourhood of the sea. The Bourbon 
cotton is grown there ; and the fine cottons 
of China are grown also in the immediate 
neighbourhood of the sea. The common 
annual cotton will come to maturity in 
four or five months ; but in cultivating the 
finer kinds in India and elsewhere, they 
may, by care, be made to ratoon, that is, to 
grow from the roots, and then the varieties 
