Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-10-27
HOW COTTON GROWS.
Some Facts About the Procedure on
a Southern Plantation.
PREPARING THE LAND FOR SEED.
Picturesque Scenes During the Cotton
Picking Season.
THE NATIONS VAST COTTON FIELD
wRITTEN FOR THE pIsPLTCH.l

ums of the city of Pittsburg and one be-
holds immense stacks of beautiful prints in
every shade and pattern, snow-white bolts OF
bleaching, brown domestics and sheetlngs oil
every width up to twelve quarters. To the
visitor these goods, in their present COM
| plete and finished state, are not at all sus-
| gestive of the various transformations they
| have undergone from the time the tiny seed
| of the cotton plant were sown in the sunny
| fields of the South until the finished fabric
is placed in the salesrooms in the Northern
cities.
With the verv beginning of the new year,
| il the weather is pleasant, the labor on the
plantation begins. The Christmas holidays
last until Epiphany, or, as the darkies call
it, "Old Christmas" after which fun and
frolic ceases, hunting parties are hard to get
| together and shooting matches are thingseof
the past Only the young people keep up
the festivities with an occasional party dur
ing the long winter evenings at some neigh
boring farm house, while the "older heads"
sit by the huge log fires and, between whiffs
at long-stem pipes and mugs of beaded
cider, seriously discuss their plans for the
successful cultivation of another cotton crop.
First to be considered is the compost" or
fertilizer. To prepare this great piles, often
containing thousands of loads of rich earth,
swamp muck or woods mold are collected.
This constitutes the absorbent to which an
active principle in the form of lime, stable
manure, or the seed from the last years
crop of cotton, is added. Some planters use
all three as different fields require, besides
commercial fertilizers. While part of the
help are thus engaged others are removing
the old growth of cotton stalks and
Ii
i. e., weather unfit for blowing and hauling,
wood cut, lightwood collected, farming i'm
plements gotten ready, logs rolled and
burned, new land grubbed, young mules
broken in, and the thousand and one odd
jobs about plantation looked after.
For two months or more the work goes
steadily on, then begin "laying off" the
rows and distributing the manure, which is
covered with one turrow of the turning plow
as fast as distributed. When all the manure
is spread the ether furrows are thrown
upon it, forming finely prepared bed three
feet and three inches wide all ready for the
reception of the cotton seed. Between the
goth Of April and the 10th of May the seed
are sown. This is done with "planter"
drawn by one mule along the center of the
prepared bed, opening the drill, evenly de-
posting the seed therein and nicely cover.
ing them at one operation-leaving the bed
fiat and smooth. Each ''row" is thus
treated, and when the field is finished it has
the appearance OF a nicely rolled garden. In
ten days, with shower of rain, the cotton
will be up "from end to end"
cHoPPING OUT.
Now for "chopping out" and securing a
"stand," which is the most important part
of the work. Every hand" that can be
mustered is put to work, and the plantation
presents scene of great activity, for the
sooner this is accomplished the better for the
crop. Plows go ahead and ''scrape off, one
side of each row; after every plow follow ten
good choppers with sharp steel hoes
blocking-eut the young plants to IA inches
apart, two to a hill. After the ten choppers
come Immediately two plows throwing the
dirt back to the cotton. Every row
chopped" during the day must have the
dirt thrown back to it before the sun goes
down. If not, the next day may be rainy
and the work is much more dificult-hence
this rule. Ten good hands will "chop" ten
acres per day, so in ten days they will 60 over
100 acres. Many planters work 80 of these
hands, so vast fields are soon gone over and
given the first working. This first work
ing" over, satisfactorily, and the planter
feels his crop comparatively safe. The
same operation, however, must be repeated
every ten days during the season, though
each time there is less work for the hoes
the ploughing often being all that is neces-
sary until the 'laying by of the crop the
last of July.
To no class of agriculturalists is the old
couplet
"He who by the plow would thrive,
Himself must either hold or drive"
more applicable than to the cotton planter.
To succeed he must indeed be hustler"
OF all crops the cotton crop is the most
capricious. Like Fortune, it is very un-
fails to give il the attention she
greater exertion On the part of man. It
seems to meet with innumerable set backs,
and often when the hopes of the planter are
brightest, few days unfavorable weather
will almost blast his prospects. 1t is very
tender plant and easily injured. The cold,
the wet, the red ants, the boil worm, the
army worm, and the caterpillars are few
OF its enemies. 1t thrives best in hot, dry
weather-when every other plant is parched
and withering it remains green and flourish
ing.
When the land is in high state of culti-
walton and the seasons are propitious, it is
the most beautiful of crops. Nothing in
agriculture is loyelier than field of luxu-
RANT cotton in full bloom. The blossoms
begin to appear about the middle Of June
(in the Gull States earlier), and continue to
open until frost August and September are
particularly lavish with the blossoms and
send them forth by untold millions every
mcrning. The bloom is very short lived
The first day it bursts forth delicate
creamy white, the next morning it has
changed to a beautiful red, the third, it
falls to the ground, and the tiny boil, con-
tanning the cotton, is seen. But the fallen
flowers are not missed, for before the red
ones drop from the parent stem other white
ones have opened on different parts of the
plant-so the field continues to present its
wealth of color. Take piece Of green vel
vet and paint it full of bell-shaped white
and red flowers and you will have minia-
ture cotton field.
OUR COTTON FIELD.
The cotton field is a vast one, stretching
from Virginia to Florida and from Tennessee
to Texas. Millions of acres are devoted to
its culture and millions of marketable bales
are annually produced. 1t is by far the
most important crop of the South. and in
ante-bellum times was called "King Cot
, ton." When this is considered one wonders
why the leaders of the Confederacy did not
adopt the cotton field as an ensign instead
of the "stars and bars" 1t would have
been more suggestive, more appropriate and
more inspiring. A green field with white
and red stars scattered over 1t would not
have made an unsightly flag.
Life on plantation, while greatly taxing
ones powers of endurance and frequently
diminishing his stock of patience, still has