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cultivation of better kinds of cotton and the erection of cleaning 
factories at Palembang the cotton industry would quickly go ahead, 
put itself at head of affairs. It requested from Government permis- 
sion to take charge of the management of the trials, and the 
buying of the produce and further asked for a concession to put up 
a factory for the cleaning and pressing of the cotton. 
The Government gave this Society its greatest possible support, 
in order to further the success of the thing. At Palembang the 
Government itself assisted in the erection of the factory, and in the 
meantime, it had distributed among the inhabitants of the different 
districts, seeds from New Orleans, for planting. This was on the 
advice of the Trading Society. I he Resident personally saw to 
the matter, as he knew that the Minister of Colonies, was strongly 
interested in the cotton industry. 
The Resident had again to report, that the seeds had nowhere 
come up, and he thought that the fault lay with the seeds. The 
seeds were dead. In in notes the Resident savs, that the cotton 
is the 'favourite plant of the natives of Palembang but that the 
changeability of the weather is disadvantageous to this cultivation. 
The cultivation is mostly done on grounds which serve for rice 
growing. 
Previous to this, under the direction of Resident Pretorius, trials 
were made with the planting of foreign varieties of cotton. The 
New Orleans seeds then imported sprang up well, but the inhabitants 
wanted to have nothing more to do with the matter after the ex- 
periences they had had with the new kinds of cotton. 
In 1847 the Director of Agricultures wrote to the Government, 
that the various trials of planting foreign varieties of cotton in fava 
had entirely failed. 
It is only lately that the last cotton undertaking, that of Mr. VAN 
Toll in Cheribon has been given up, and it may be taken on the 
grounds of these experiments that Java is not suited for this industry. 
- In the Palembang Residency, also the ground and conditions 
seem to be less suitable for the kinds of cotton, wanted in the 
European markets, than for the native kinds. It only remains for 
the inhabitants there to choose the latter kind. I see little or no 
advantage in inducing them to grow foreign cotton. 
It would be of more advantage to the inhabitants of Palembang 
to show them, before all, a wav of better preparing and cleaning 
their own products. 
The Governor-General wrote to the Minister fer Colonies in 1848 
the following:— 
tl Truly all experiments of this kind in Java have proved unsuc- 
cessful and they have shewn, that disregarding the injurious in- 
fluence which the moist air and the changeability of the weather 
have on the cotton fruit, a certain worm which burrows Into the 
fruit and spoils it before thov have reached full maturity, proves to 
be an obstacle, scarcely removable, against the growing, in Java, 
cotton suitable for the European markets, in sufficient quantities to 
repay the cost and leave a profit. ' 5 
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