Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1881-09-27
The Future Of Cotton.


There are some who hold that the late
war was partly waged to dethrone cotton
as king. That monarch was certainly
powerful one in the DAYS of slavery.
and, it has never been denied, affected
our politics and history and did much to
frame our legislation. The war is over
now; but cotton is king again, as pow
erful, nay more powerful than he was in
the good old times. If the South, by
virtue of the production of crop worth
$500, 0O0, 900, was then great in the coun-
ellis of the nation and the markets of the
world, how much more pu werful must it
be TO day with crop worth $300, 900, 600
which, it will make worth 81 ) 600, 600, 900
when it shall have been obtained, as it
certainly will, monopoly of the manu-
facture of cotton goods. -,---
A representative of Northern paper,
in the very heart of that district now
rolling in wealth, gained by transform
ing the great Southern staple into cloth,
the Boston Post, after a tour through
only small portion of the cotton belt,
and by no means its most promising Sec
ton, is filed with wonder at what he
has seen, at the facts and figures shown
him, and is almost ready to bow in wor-
ship of the supposed dethroned king.
There are fortunes, immense fortunes to
be made in cotton, he asserts; there is no
field offering such promise to the man of
energy as the white fields of our South
ern land; there is no such opening in
the wide expanse of the Union as the
staple and its manufacture into
cotton goods on Southern
soil. The Post correspondent is
as earnest on this latter point as the
Democrat. He scouts the weak sugges-
tons of some would-be political econo-
mists that the Southern people are not
adapted to factory work; and cites one
irrefutable, overwhelming argument in
favor of Southern cotton mills, The ar
gument of profit, that the $50 cotton fac
tories south of the Potomac yield aver
age dividends of 224 per cent A Mas
sachusetts man himself, he confesses that
the glory of his own State, that which
makes its rocks richer than the best
quartz of Nevada's bonanza, must soon
pass away to the South. This has long
been threatened; what will bring it about
effectually and quickly will be the At
lanta Exposition 1t must be conceded
that the Southern people are little old
fashioned in the cultivation of cotton.
There is no need of seeking explana-
tions for this, they are so numerous; the
carelessness of the negro, the Interrupt
tons of the war, the cheapness of lands
all these have made cotton planting
loose, careless and improvident While
the West has a hundred different culti--
vators, mowers and harvesters to aid its
farmers. so that on the great wheat
farms, like that of the Dalrymples in
Minnesota, two thirds of the work is
done by steam, cotton is cultivated in the
most simple manner, with muscle and
hoe and pillow, showing but little inn
provement since the days of Abraham,
if we except only the cotton gin.
OF late, in the CarolInas and Georgia,
there has been some slight Improvement.
Cotton is more carefully cultivated
there, and there is less waste, and more
fertllizing and care. The result has
proved so successful that our farmers
are compelled to admit that cotton is a
plant which it pays to cultivate closely
and carefully, fact long doubted and
denied. There are many other ideas
and tricks about cotton planting, cur
rent in different sections of the country,
which would benefit the whole South if
they were only better and more geneT-
ally known. The Atlanta Exposition is
expected to do all this, when the in
telligent Southern farmers meet to talk
these questions over, when they see,
tried practically before them, the various
plans of planting and raising cotton, the
cultivation of this staple will
take a step forward, which. under
other circumstances, would have requir-
ed score of years. The study of the
various kinds of machinery for cotton
planting, harvesting, ginning and manu-
featuring will undoubtedly brighten the
intellect of the mechanic and inventor,
and may-we certainly hope it will
suggest the missing point needed to per-
feet that engine, so necessary to the cot
ton fields, and which will work as great
a revolution in the history of cotton as
did the gin-the picker. There will be
a score or more of patents for pickers
exhibited Who knows but what IN
one of these will be found the long
sought for machine, or that it will at
least suggest the idea for it TO some
inventor. We do not think we are
expecting too much when we hope for
all this from the Atlanta Cotton Exposi.
ton, when we believe that it will bring
forth ideas that will make cotton a greater
king than ever: a peaceful king, how
ever, with the Midas power of turning
everything it touches into gold.