1 May, 1902.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. 377 
needs any comment from me. As a general thing the crop paid fully as well as, 
and in most instances far better than, the crops of maize or hay generally 
produced. The question of labour for picking, which is so formidable a one in 
most rural industries, never, in our experience, became a critical matter. I do 
not deny that labour difficulties may arise under certain conditions, but those 
conditions can be avoided by planters cultivating small areas. Cotton-growing 
is essentially the small farmer’s crop. The intelligent planter will not cultivate 
more acres than he, with the assistance of his family or with the help of his 
neighbours, can cope with. To grow cotton on the huge plantation system, 
depending on hired labour exclusively, is not so likely to succeed for obvious 
reasons. — 
Farmers located near populous towns will have the advantage at the pick- 
ing season of the services of the youths anxious for light employment. Cotton- 
icking for a few months in the year would be an ideal country holiday to 
undreds of this class. The hop-picking season in Tasmania and the berry 
season in Victoria are responsible for a large exodus of boys and girls from the 
cities, and the change to a healthy rural vocation, with its sunshine and free 
life, is both a boon and a source of financial gain to them Cotton-picking, of 
all farm employments, suits the town children the best. It requires no skill, 
is clean, light work, demanding only attention in keeping dirt and leaves from 
the cotton-pod and a little deftness of finger. A good cotton-picker is sure of 
pickiny his 80 to 100 lb. a day, if the fibre is well out in pod. 
Of course, farmers living remote from railways and centres of population 
will not easily get this class of surplus labour, and must trust to their own 
resources in dealing with the crop. 
Those living in proximity to large towns can rely on getting labour. So 
far as this phase of operations connected with its cultivation is concerned, the 
question need not deter anyone from engaging in the business of cotton- 
growing. It is true that a demand may be made upon school children at 
critical periods to assist in gathering a fast ripening crop, but the demand 
upon the scholars’ time need not be such as to materially affect the course of 
their education. The prospects of this crop coming to the front again in 
Queensland are very great. It is a crop that adapts itself to almost any soil, 
save the very fertile. There the shrub outgrows itself to the detriment of the 
yield of fibre. 
Jt requires no special implements for tillage purposes. 
It stands drought far better than any crop we now grow. 
It is a crop that is moderately cheap to carry to market. In proportion 
to its weight it realises a higher value than most other crops. 
It is not so exhausting to the soil by reason of it assimilating elements of 
plant food rejected by other crops usually grown. 
The value of the by-products contained in the seed, thanks to chemical 
science and invention, now ranks high in the realm of agricultural products. 
Oil, soap, paper, lard and butter substitutes, cattle food of highest value, 
fertilisers, are all obtained from this source. 
It has lately been stated in some American papers that, so useful has 
cotton seed become as an article of commerce, attention might well be 
given, not so much to the production of lint as to the yield of seed. 1 well 
remember hundreds of tons of seed being dumped on the banks of the Bremer, 
to ultimately rot or be washed away in the first flood. 
The farmer who starts cotton-growing will find the demand for barn space 
far less than that required for maize, hay, &c. If his cotton has been gathered 
in fine weather, a few hours’ drying in the sun on his drying tables will fit it to 
stow away in his barn or bale, and allow him to send it at once to the ginning 
establishment, there to receive the value of his product. 
These facts all illustrate the adaptability of the crop to our State farming 
conditions. I am well aware that, owing to the cessation of cotton-growing in 
past years, many persons are prejudiced against its revival. However, it needs 
but an honest inquiry into the causes of the cessation to clearly show that when 
