The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1894-09-25
HISTORY OF THE COTTON PLANT.
INTERESTING DOCUMENT FROM
CLEMSON COLLEGE.

Growth and Manufacture for Many
Years Confined to MISUNDERSTANDING
and Pliny Wrote About1t.
The authorities of Clemson College
have issued q deeply interesting bulle-
tin on Fertilizer Experiments with
Cotton" including q historical sketch,
IL comparison of varieties, the classif-
cation and grade of crossed varieties.
The historical sketch is prepared by
John N. Hook, and every farmer and
every man, no matter what his occupa.
ton, can read it with profit:
Cotton (Gossypiuml-The order to
which this belongs is Malyacea. Okra
and the hollyhock are embraced in the
same family. The word cotton is de-
rived from the Arabic word koton.
Skinner, tho etymologist, says cotton
is so called from its similtude to the
down which adheres to the ounce,
Malls cydomis.
An examination into the history Of
the great materials designed by Provi-
dence for human clothing develops the
remarkable fact that not n was as
signed to Europe. Asia was literally
supplied, receiving all-cotton, flax,
the silk worm-and it's mountains are
known to have been the home of the
sheep, which frequently attain the
oiSS VI IL itiho" uSSts l. "Slo III SU
made in China, and the produce OF tho
silk worm was first brought China to
to Constantinople by.two Persian monks
IN the reign of Justinian, A. d. 552.
Fla is indigenous in Egypt and also in
Observation-Disclosures Mexico, PIP. 25,
26.) Of the four staple fibers used in
cloth making, cotton and fax are of
vegetable origin, while silk and wool
are animal products. In this provi-
Dental assignment, to Africa and
America were given flax and cotton.
Cotton was known to the ancient
Asiastics and Egyptians, and it is said
inter-tropical regions. Columbus, Ma
gellan, Drake, Cavendish, Dampler,
and indeed, nearly all tho early voy-
ayers and explorers, concur in repro
senting tina they saw cotton growing
wild and in great abundance in the
West India Islands and on the CONT
nent. Columbus found in ST. Salvador,
where he first landed, the women
dressed in short cotton coats" and
his crew exchanged caps, beads and
other toys for cotton yarn"
The growth and manufacture of cot
ton for many centuries were confined
exclusively to India. Herodotus, tho
father of history, who lived AS years
'S'ohN OHi iOSo IL 1llIlaD1-
tants Of that country make their cloth
es of the product of a certain plant,
which. instead Of fruit, produces wool
OF a finer and better quality than
sheep" Pliny, who lived A. ID. IS, in
forms us, "There grows in upper
Egypt, near Arabia, shrub called Cos
sypium, by others xylon, from which
stutfs are made that we call xylina. 1t
Is small and bears a fruit resembling
the tilbort, within q downy wool, which
is spun into thread" The same author,
speaking of the production of tho island
of TylOs, in the Persian Gulf, mentions
"WOol-bearing trees that bear a fruit
like a gOurd and the size of aquince,
which, bursting wnen it is ripe, dis
plays a ball of downy wool, from which
are made costly garments, Of q fabric
resembling linen" A late writer has
also observed, that as fax could not be
successfully grown on the soil of Ara
bia, and the climate too hot for the fine
fleece OF sheep, that cotton must have
been utilized for the purposes of cloth
ing in the infancy of the human race.
The Hebrew writer's mako no allu-
sion to the wool-bearing shrub. In
Greek and Roman literature only the
slightest notices of it are to be found.
This omission seems to be due to the
~ io ohO hSpioioS lhS upOu
the Mediterranean, were utterly unac-
quainted with the populous countries
beyond the Indus. Virgil, in the Sec
ond Georgia, must beyond all doubt
have referred to the cotton plant when
he says: "Shall sing of the groves
of Ethiopia hoary with soft wool, and
how the Sores comb out the delicate
fleece from among the leaves" Prince
of the Latin poets, it was he who was
commissioned by the authorities of his
country to employ his pen in the inter-
est OF agriculture, that he might in
spire new life and enterprise into the
work OF the husbandman, as vol as en-
liven it with the charms of poetic num-
bers. Tho silence of the writer's OF the
middle ages, in regard to cotton ia
brics, while describing the vestments
then In common use, leaves us to infer
that the cotton manufacturing indus.
try was passing through al interval of
temporary suspension, and hat wool
on, linen and silk constituted the ma
tcrial from which the customary cloth
ing OF the people was made during that
period. But Governor Seabrook says
N%earchus, Alexander's Admiral, de-
seconded the Indus 1921 years b. G. and
observed that "The Indians wore gar
ments, the substance whereof they
"olo "uuS growing upon UfceS
and this is indeed fax or rather somc-
thing much winter and finer than fax"
Aud, sit is certain, however, that at
the time Of the Hegira A. d. 622 cotton
cloth was q common material of dress"
Cotton in it's wild state, and espec-
tally in tropical climates, is said to be
a perennial shrub. Marco Polo, the
confidential agent Of the Tartar con-
queror Of China, who visited many
countries, ''saw cotton growing album
dainty in Mosul, opposite the ancient
Ninovah, in Persia, and ut Guzzerat,
in which latter place it was produced
from q tree six yards high which bore
twenty years" As cultivated in the
South, however, it is only an annual
plant.
For four centuries tho herbaceous
cotton Of India was grown in the gar
dens of China for the beauty of its
flowers, before receiving any attention
for domestic uses. That great empire,
with all its knowledge OF the arts, was
remarkably slow in developing any
progress liz the cultivation OF cotton, as
a staple crop while its people we're the
original manufacturers OF silk. paper
and sugar the first to become ac-
quainted with tho properties of the
magnet, and the composition OF gun
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