Cottise

[From Lat. costa.] ( Her.) See COTISE. Co:'tleville, in Mi ouri, a post-office of St. Charles co. Corion, (kol'tn,) n. [Fr. cot on; It. cotone; Ar. kotn, ko to: Hind. gootn, ruhi; Ger. baumwolle; Du. katoen, voomwol; Sp. algodon; Por. algodas; Swed. bomull; Ru , chlobtschataja bumaja; Pol. bawelna; Sansk.hap a sa: Malay, kapas; Lat. go ypium.] ( Bot.) The hair covering the seeds in all the species of the genus Go y pium, or cotton-plant, order Malvacea. These hairs upon the seeds, and the occurrence of three leafy bracts, united at their base outside the flower, constitute the distinctive characters of the genus. From the importance of C. as a raw material, the genus Go ypium must be regarded as one of the most valuable to man in the whole vegetable kingdom. There appear to be four distinct species. Many other so-called species have been described, but they are probably mere varieties. The first C. fabrics were manufactured from the hairs of the species G. herbaceum (see fig. 188), the common cotton plant of India. The stems are le woody than in other species; hence its specific name, which signifies herbaceous. It is a pretty plant, and rises from 18 inches to 2 feet in height during the first year of growth. It is usually cut down annually; but if allowed to grow, it will attain a height of 5 or 6 feet, and its branches will become rather woody. All the younger parts of the stem are covered with short hairs, and marked with black spots. The flowers are bright yellow, each petal being marked with a purple spot near the base. The flower is succeeded by a fruit, which gradually becomes dry, and then bursts into 3 or 4 valves, when the cotton wool is seen i uing from it in all directions. This is the Surat C. of commerce, The C. is generally white; but much of that produced in China is of the yellow or tawny color, peculiar to the fabric called " Nankeen." G. arboreum, the tree-cotton, is another Indian species, but, unlike the last, it a umes the aspect and dimensions of a small tree, from 15 to 20 feet in height. The flowers are of a bright-red color. The C. hairs are remarkably soft and silky, and are woven by the natives into a very fine muslin, used for turbans by the privileged religious cla es only. G. barb a dense is the species which yields all our best C. It is called the Bar badoes, or Bour bon C., but does not appear to have been originally a native of the New World. It is a perennial plant, and has a shrubby stem, from six to fifteen ft. in height. The flowers are yellow, like those of G. herbaceum, and have a dark spot at the base of each petal. The fruit is capsular, and contains in its interior from 8 to 12 black seeds, which, on being freed from the cotton wool, are found Fig . 702.-BARB A DOES COTTON. (Go ypium barb a dense.) (See also fig. 188.) to be destitute of down, unlike those of the preceding species, which are covered with firmly adhering short hairs. The plant was introduced into Georgia from the Bahama Islands, where it had been grown from seed obtained in the West Indies. In the small American islands which fringe the coast of Georgia, this plant has produced the celebrated Sea - Island C., which is unrivalled for the length of its staple, its strength, and its silkine . This variety is restricted to the islands and a narrow belt of mainland on the immediate coast of the Atlantic, extending from the Great Pedee River, in N. Carolina, to Cape Canaveral, in Florida. The same plant, when cultivated in the cooler and drier climates of the hill-country of Georgia, is inferior in quality, and shorter in staple. This fact shows how great is the influence of external circumstances on the growth of the cotton-plant. The species G. peruvianum , or acumina tum , is supposed to be indigenous to America. Like the Bourbon C., it has black seeds and yellow flowers. The seeds adhere together, however, in a peculiar way, forming a kidney-shaped ma . This plant furnishes the S. American varieties of C., as Pernambuco, Peru vian, Maranham, and Brazilian . After the Sea-Island and Egyptian, these S. American C. obtain the highest price in the market. C. is now extensively cultivated in Egypt, in S. Africa, in India, and in Australia; but it will be long before the supplies from these parts can compete with those from the U. States. If examined under the microscope, the C.-hair will be found apparently to consist of two delicate transparent tubes, the one twisted round the other. If, however, the hair be examined in its young state, it will be found to be an untwisted cylindrical tube. Its changed appearance when it reaches its maturity can be accounted for by the circumstances under which it is developed. As the seeds and hairs grow, the capsules do not appear to expand with equal rapidity; and, consequently, the hair is exposed to pre ure on all sides. The result of this is, that the hair collapses in the middle, leaving a hair formed tube on each side. These uncollapsed portions of the hair give it the appearance of a flat ribbon, with a hem or border at each edge. The hair does not, however, grow out straight, but, coming in contact with other hairs and the sides of the capsular fruit, it becomes twisted. This twisting is undoubtedly the great fact that makes the C.-hair of value to man. There are many hairs, such as those of the cotton - gra and the Bombaz , which are as long and apparently as strong as those of the G. , but which, failing in this irregularity of surface, are utterly incapable of being twisted into a thread or yarn. The twisting gives the C.-hair the power of uniting with its fellows, and forming with them a cord strong enough to be woven. Production. Columbus found the cotton-plant growing wild in Hispaniola, and later explorers recognized it as far N. as the country bordering the Meschachebe, or Mi i ippi. In the U. States, cotton-seeds were first planted, as an experiment in 1621, ( Purchas's Pilgrims,) and in a paper of the date of 1666, preserved in Carroll's Historical Collections of S. Carolina , the growth of the cotton-plant is noticed in the province of Carolina. It was, however, little known except as a garden-plant, until after the Revolutionary war. The first succe ful crop in S. Carolina was that of W. Elliott, in 1790. Ilis succe caused many to engage in the cultivation of C., and some of the largest fortunes in S. Carolina were thus accumulated. But the region adapted to the production of the sea-island C. was limited, and the amount of 8,000,000 lbs. raised in 1805 was not exceeded by the subsequent crops. The culture of the other varieties, distinguished by the green instead of the black seed of the sea-island, was rapidly extended from the last years of the 18th century throughout the Southern States. Production of Cotton in the U. S. for 1895: IMG:content-0389.png:[blocks in formation] The C. crop of the U. S. has risen from 1,038,848 bales in 1830, to 9,476,435 in 1895, the largest annual crop yet produced in this country. The C. crop of 1896 was 8,250,710 bales. During the Civil War the manufacturing countries of Europe suffered severely, as is well known, from the almost absolute stoppage of their usual C. supplies from the U.S.; and, in this emergency, turned their attention towards encouraging the growth of the staple in other countries, as Brazil, Venezuela, Egypt, India, . This experiment was attended with succe ful results, in so far as concerned the obtaining of a sufficient quantity of the article to keep the spinners going; but it was also found that the C. of the countries named, being of short staple, and of inferior quality, generally, to the American, could not compete with the long-stapled varieties grown in this country-more especially the "sea islands," which always carry the top prices in foreign markets. The qualities from the above-mentioned countries were found to run pretty much as follows:Egyptian, good , fair to middling; Brazilian, good ; middling-fair to middling : Venezuelan, middling ; middling fair to poor: East India (Surat), barely middling ; poor, often dirty. It was at one time anticipated that negro emancipation in the Southern States would seriously, if not disastrously, check the future growth of the staple in that section. This, however, did not prove to be the case. The industrial system of the South had been thoroughly disorganized by the war, but it soon began to recover, the cultivation of C. was actively resumed, and as early as 1869 the crop approximated the heavy yields of the years immediately preceding the war, while the fibre was of excellent quality. As a result, American cotton recovered its former status in European markets, while the price steadily declined, reaching the average price of 1860 (121⁄2 cents) in 1876, in which year the crop of 1860 (4,824,000 bales) was almost reached. It was first exceeded in 1879 (5,073,000 bales). In subsequent years the price continued to decline, this being due largely to reduced cost of production, lower land and ocean freights, and the doing away with unnece ary middlemen. In 1883 the crop reached nearly 7,000,000 bales; in 1888, it slightly exceeded 7,000,000 bales; in 1892 it reached 9,038,707 bales, and in 1895 the maximum, as given in the above table. (Cultivation.) The upland varieties have been cultivated nearly as far N. as Lat. 40°, but only under favorable circumstances. Cotton-patches are to be seen in S. Illinois and S. Mi ouri, where the plant is grown for domestic use; and in many families the hand-loom is yet in vogue. "As a great commercial staple, however, its culture embraces a belt of country 100 m. or more in width-underlaid by the Cretaceous formation - which starts near the N. line of the State of Mi i ippi, and, sweeping round the base of the Alleghanies through Alabama, Georgia, S. Carolina, and N. Carolina, extends as far N. as Raleigh, and even Richmond, Va. The S. limit of this belt is where it comes in contact with the region of 'Pine-Barrens,' whose soil consists of Pliocene-Tertiary sands. Its culture extends up the Mi i ippi Valley to Memphis, and up the lower valleys of the White, Arkansas, and Red rivers. The cotton soils are of moderate fertility, and when stripped of timber, are exceedingly liable to wash into gullies and ravines. After a few croppings, they are very difficult to renovate, since they do not admit of a rotation of crops. The climate is unfit for the growth of the nutritious gra es, and hence, where the ground lies fallow for a few years to recover its productive powers, it ceases to be profitable. The gra es which spring up are coarse, and afford little nutriment to cattle. The forage of the planter is derived from corn-stalks, cut before maturity; and hence, throughout the region, we find no herds of cattle or swine; nor can any course of industry render stock-raising profitable." (Mr. Foster's Mi i ippi Valley.) Cotton, when raised within the frost-line, must always be planted, if po ible, after the last frost in spring, as it is more easily killed by cold than any other plant; and when once bitten by frost it cannot recover, like corn, but must be re-planted. Before planting, the ground must be broken deeply and thoroughly. This should be done in February or March, for plantations in the Carol in as, Georgia, Alabama, Tenne ee, or Arkan sas; in January, for plantations in Florida, Mi i ippi, Louisiana, or Texas. We can, of course, only generalize in an article so brief as this must be; but it will be readily seen, by any one po e ed of only a little knowledge of geography, that S. Georgia and S. Ala bam a have seasons like those of S. Mi i ippi, Louisi ana, Texas, . The next step in the proce , after having broken the ground well, and permitted it to lie thus for a few weeks, is to " bed up " the ground, as the planters phrase it, for putting in the seed. The row's are laid off from 3 to 4 feet apart in the thinner lands, from three to seven feet in the rich lands of Louisiana and Texas-with a narrow-bladed plough - generally with a scooter. The fertilizer is now dropped in this furrow, and a ridge, or bed, made upon it with a turning plough. One furrow on each side of the fertilized ridge is sufficient. Now the preparation for planting has been handsomely made; the next, and last step in the proce is to open the ridge with a scooter, drop in the seeds, and cover them. The covering is rapidly and well effected by a board screwed to the helve of a scooter. The board should be long enough to extend acro the cotton-row, and have a scoop, or groove, cut in the centre of it, corresponding to the width of the furrow in which the seeds have been dropped. The seeds should be rubbed or rolled in wet ashes just previous to planting, to destroy the adhesion of the cotton fibres that will remain with the seeds of upland C. after the very best ginning now known to planters. The Sea Island C., or, as it is often called, "black-seed," and "long-staple," may be dropped without this rolling in ashes; as, when it is ginned, or picked from the seeds by hand, very little lint is left on the seeds. After it shall have sprung from the ground to the height of abt. two inches, it is "chopped out" with a hoe. Two or 3 stalks are all that should be left in one spot to grow; and these spots, or hills, should be 8 to 18 inches apart, according to the strength of the soil. Of course the gra , the great enemy of all plants, and specially of C., must be cut out when this chopping is performed. In 8 to 10 days after the chopping the plant must be hoed, or have dirt thrown gently around the tender stalk, with a small plough. In two weeks more the C. should be again ploughed, and carefully cleaned of all gra by a hoe-hand. In 2 to 3 weeks more another ploughing must be given, and you have little else to do with it save to keep the gra out, specially now from the middles; for if weeds and gra grow there, they will give to the pickers a very troublesome crop of seeds and dry leaves in the fall and winter. C. must not be ploughed when the ground is very wet. - The picking is generally done by hand, and should be commenced in July or August, as soon as the matured C. is well open. One hand can pick from 100 to 200, and even 300 lbs. per day, under very favorable circumstances. Cotton-picking machines have been devised for expediting this important branch of C. culture, but as yet the hand is the only cotton picker that gives satisfactory results. The C. first picked, before the autumnal rains have dirtied it, or the October frosts turned it yellow, is the best: and must be ginned and packed by itself, to command the best price in market. If the "storm cotton" or the frosted cotton be mixed with it, the price of the whole lot will be depreciated in consequence.-After having been picked C. is spread out and dried, and then separated from the seeds. The latter proce was formerly performed by hand-a tedious operation, by which one hand could clean only a pound or so a day;-but since the invention of the saw-gin by Eli Whitney, in 1793, the proce of cleaning has been both rapid and effectu al. This machine is composed of a hopper, having on side formed of strong parallel wires, placed so close together as to exclude the pa age of the seeds from with i. The wool is dragged through the apertures by me as of circular saws attached to a large roller and made to revolve beween the wires, the seeds sink in to the bottom of the hopper. This proce is adoptec only in cleaning the short-sta The American Dictionary and Cyclopedia pled varieties of American C., the seeds of which adhere so firmly to the wool as to require a considerable amount of force to separate them. The Sea-Island variety is cleaned by being pa ed through two small rollers, which revolve in opposite directions, and easily throw off the hard, smooth seeds. In India, though the sawgin has been introduced in some districts, the wool is mostly cleaned by means of the primitive roller. Both descriptions of gins are used in Egypt and the Brazils. The C. cleaned by the roller-gin, being uninjured thereby in staple, realizes the better price; but the deterioration caused by the saw-gin is compensated for by the greatly increased quantity cleaned; the latter turning out four or five times as much work as the former, in an equal space of time, and thereby considerably reducing the expense of cleaning. After the worms (see Noctuide ), which destroy the pod, or the cotton-plant itself, and against which we have, as yet, no means of defence, the chief enemy of C. is rust . Against this something can be done. "The cause of rust," says Mr. D. Dicks on, of Hancock county, Georgia, in a valuable article published in the Southern Cultivator, "is plainly marked, and the indications readily understood. There is a weed, (I call it rust- weed ), that marks all land that will rust C. This weed is now green, (Feb. 8th.) but in a few weeks it will be very rusty. Lands that will certainly rust C. are such as are not properly drained; low, sandy lands; land under bluffs, that is sandy, and inclined to be springy: poor land that is sandy and porous, having the clay a good way below the surface, and also resting on pipe-clay; and sandy land that gets gra y in July to September. Rust is caused also by very heavy rains; by guano alone, which causes a very heavy crop of bolls; and, lastly, by poverty and bad work. The remedy is: To drain the land well; rest it, to accumulate humus; haul red-clay on the sandy land; plough deep, and subsoil before planting. The land should be well mixed throughout with clay and vegetable mould, at least 9 inches deep. The best manure to prevent rust, is 200 Ibs. of di olved bones, 100 lbs. Peruvian guano, 200 to 300 lbs. of salt, and 100 lbs. of land-plaster (plaster of Paris), per aсге, The above remedies will return one hundred per cent. interest to the owner. All lands may be made good cotton-lands by the use of the spade, clay humus (or vegetable matter), and the above manures. Lands that will produce 100 lbs. of lint C. without manure, if level, are worth $10 per acre; and level land that will produce 400 lbs. of lint C. per acre, with manure, is worth $100 per acre. Here is a margin of $90 to pay for improving an acre of land. It can be done. and 50 per cent. made on the manures purchased every year; always returning the cotton-seed back to the land, when in C., or its share of stable-manure, when in corn." Cotton Manufacture. This important branch of textile fabrics has its origin in India and China, in which countries it was known and operated in many centuries before being understood by the moderns. Among ancient writers Hero dot us is the first who mentions this staple; called by him tree- wool . Both the Greeks and Romans imported their raw material from India. About the 10th century, this manufacture was introduced by the Moors into Spain, where its products flourished principally in the form of coarse cloths, canvas, . In Italy, cotton fabrics began to be manipulated at about much the same period. The Netherlands was the next country to adopt the art, which from thence was transplanted into England by the Protestant refugees from Flanders, after the capture of Antwerp by the Duke of Parma in 1585. In 1641, Manchester is recorded as receiving cotton-wool from Smyrna and Cyprus, and manufacturing it into various stuffs. In 1660 all colonial cotton was ordered to be sent to England for manufacture, and in 1760 the annual value of the trade was estimated at only $1,000,000. From the first introduction of the C. M. into Great Britain down to 1773, the weft or transverse threads of the web only, were of cotton; the warp , or longitudinal threads, consisting wholly of linen yarn. In the first stage of the manufacture the weavers, dispersed in cottages throughout the country, furnished themselves as well as they could with the warp and weft for their webs, and carried them to market when they were finished; but the impo ibility of making any considerable division among the different branches of a manufucture so conducted, or of prosecuting them on a large scale, added to the interruption given to the proper busine of the weavers by the nece ity of attending to the cultivation of the patches of ground which they generally occupied, opposed great obstacles to its progre . In 1767, however, James Hargreaves (q. v.) invented the spinning-jenny. At first this admirable machine enabled 16 to 30 threads to be spun with the same facility as 1; and it was subsequently brought to such perfection, that a little girl was enabled to work no fewer than from 80 to 120 spindles. The jenny was applicable only to the spinning of cotton for weft, being unable to give to the yarn that degree of firmne and hardne which is required for the longitudinal threads or warp; but this deficiency was soon after supplied by the introduction of the spinning-frame (1769-1775) that wonderful piece of machinery which spins a vast number of threads of any degree of finene and hardne , leaving to man merely to feed the machine with cotton, and to join the threads when they happen to break. It is not difficult to understand the priciple on which this machine is constructed, and the mode of its operation. It consists of two pairs of rollers "urned by means of machinery. The lower roller of each pair is furrowed or fluted longitudinally, and the pper one is covered with leather, to make them takes hold of the cotton. If there were only one pair of rol ers, it is clear that a carding of cotton pa ed between would be drawn forward by the revolution of the rollers, but it would merely undergo a certain degree of compre ion from their action. No sooner, however, has the carding, or roving as it is technically termed, begun to pa through the first pair of rollers, than it is received by the second pair, which are made to revolve with (as the case may be) 3, 4, or 5 times the velocity of the first pair. By this admirable contrivance the roving is drawn out into a thread of the desired degree of tenuity; a twist being given to it by the adaptation of the spindle and fly of the common flax wheel to the machinery. Sir Richard Ark wright ( q . v.) gave his machine the name of the water -frame; but it has since become better known as the spinning - frame . Nearly at the same time that the spinning department was thus wonderfully improved, Dr. Cartwright, a clergyman of Kent, invented the power - loom (in 1787), a machine which has already gone far to supersede weaving by the hand. While these extraordinary inventions were being made, Watt was perfecting the steam-engine, and was thus not only supplying the manufactur times, in order to correct all inequalities. The next proce is roving , a continuation of the drawing. The cord, which is now called a rove, being much thinner, has a slight twist given to it by pa ing through a can, which is made to revolve with great velocity while receiving it. It is then wound upon bobbins, and is ready for the spinning-frame. As the spinning and weaving of cotton differ very slightly from that of silk, linen, woollen, ., they will be found described under the articles SPINNING and WEAVING.