Remarks on Agriculture and Agricultural Productions [pp. 382-391]

AND THE AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS.
advanced the pastures become insufficient, and cultivated lands will be
applied to this business. The value of stock must, then, in addition to
the expense of attendance, be at least equal to that of the crops which
might be realized by tillage. Bread and butcher's meat come, then, to
a par. Indeed, if ordinary pastures were not as profitable as cultivated
land, they would be soon cultivated.
The United States, from a very early period, had a sufficiency of animal products to make large exportations abroad. This portion of our
export becomes every year more diversified and extensive. "Though
all the cattle," observed Adam Smith, near a century ago, " of the European colonies in America, were originally carried from Europe, they
soon multiplied there, and became of so little value, that even horses
were allowed to run wild in the woods without thinking it worth while
to claim them."*
COTTON.-This great staple, which has raised a revolution in the
world, and changed almost entirely the character and comfort of the
clothing which indigent man usually requires, belongs principally to the
history of our country, and, we might say, the history of our very generation.
Cotton is indigenous to America. Though not the most beautiful in its
fabrics, it yields to none in its cheapness, comfort and health, in the
coldest as in the hottest climates.
It is conjectural how remote are the uses of cotton, or to what extent.
From the word carpas, in Esther-oriental for cotton-it is supposed the
Jews were acquainted with it. Herodotus, four hundred years before
Christ, makes mention of the tree as growing in India, from which
cloth was made. Some of the generals of Alexander, in the East, noticed and described the cotton wool. The use of this fabric among the
Greeks and Romans goes back but a little beyond the Christian era, and
it was then only as an article of the most exquisite luxury.
It has long been supposed that cotton cloths were made in remote antiquity in Egypt, and that the mummies were embalmed in them. Even
Virgil held
" Soft wool, from downy groves, the Ethiop weaves,"t
but Mr. Thompson, of England, has forever closed the vexatious ques tion, by subjecting the numerous specimens of this cloth to a powerful
microscope. In no case has he discovered a single fibre of cotton in
them.e
The Latin and botanical word for this plant is gossypium. From the
resemblance of its pod to a quince, Cotoneum Malum, the present name
Cotton is derived.
The culture of cotton began first in the East. The Chinese produce
largely, but also import from Surat and Bombay and other parts of
India, and, what is remarkable, that although cotton was cultivated in
gardens from remote antiquity in China, yet it was never turned to any
account until the end of the thirteenth century. In central Africa the
cotton plant abounds.
* According to Ulloa, in 1730, the value of an ox in Buenos Ayres, was 21~d 45c.
t Domestic Life and Manufactures of the Ancients.
I Later examinations have established that cotton, as well as wool, was used for
mummy cloths. See Dr. Hawks' late work on Egypt.
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