The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-02-19
 HISTORY OF COTTON RAISING
In the States of the South-What the Gin and the Ealing Screw Did for the Crop. Judge Richard H. Clarke in the Atlanta
 EN.- IL-.-

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 and the Ealing Screw Did for the Crop.
 Judge Richard H. Clarke in the AtlantI
 Constitution.l
 Before the invention of the cotton-gin
 cotton, being required only for use al
 nome, was raised in very small quan
 titles, just as much as could be manu
 factured into cloth by the use of the
 loom and the spinning-wheel, which to.
 gether with wool would be necessary tc
 clothe the families and their slaves
 Hence, spinning and weaving was ne-
 cessary part of farm and plantation in-
 dustry and was carried on with system.
 This furnished the farmers with all
 their wearing apparel I have seen rich
 farmers clad in jeans and homespun | even at court and other public places.
 Every garment, they wore was woven at home except their shoes and hats even the socks were knitted at home.
 It did not take much cotton to accom- plish this, and the acreage required was
 so small, compared with that required for loom, the ground it grew on was called the 'cotton patch" It thus re- ceiVed that name, and was so called
 long after the patch had grown into the field. It was only raised in patches be- cause of the difficulty of separating the seed from the lint The old people
 mostly old women and children, were detailed for that purpose, which they had to do by the hard and tedious pro- n t6a 'ntIf xtrffI hafV fingers.
 When the cotton-gin "got to going this process was stopped by all who were able to buy a gin and place it in position, and of course there were not many who had to continue the old pro cess. But after getting the gin the planter was puzzled to know how he should pack the lint to send to market, and the only way to get to market then, unless by 8, navlgable stream, was by wagon, and in most instances after sev- eral days journey. This problem was solved by getting such bagging as was then to be had and making out of it bags in which to pack the cotton These were necessarily round, and that they might be handled after the pack ing, at each end of the bag portion of the bagging was left loose and fastened around so as to make a knot to be talk en hold of by which to handle the bag. A hole was left in the floor of the lint room of enough capacity to let the bag down, and then it was fastened so 1t would hold the weight of the cotton af- ter packing and the weight of man during the packing, who would get in the bag and stamp it down with his feet aided by a crowbar or other heavy instrument. When these bags were we'll packed and sewed each weighed about three hundred pounds. At least on a crop of from fifty to three hun dred bags the average was three hun dred pounds. When I say bags I mean bags as distinguished from bales, as they were called after the invention of the cotton-screw and the box which went with it.
 An important effect of the invention of the cotton-gin was to raise the price of slaves. They were then very low from two causes. One was that there was a large per cent. of them native Africans and the other was that there could be nothing raised from their la bor that would pay except rice, and that was limited to a small extent of | comparatively. Tn the days | bong before the cotton-gin good horse | was worth more than a slave. A gen tleman told me he had read the will of | one of his ancestors, who bequeathed | his horses, mules and other livestock | to his daughters, because they were so much more valuable than his negroes. The increased culture of cotton, by | means of the gin, had so advanced the | price that it increased the price of slaves and the planters went to buying nore land and more slaves, until many planters got to owning them by the even up to the thousands lided, of course, by their natural in- ,rease.
 The invention of the cotton-screw, with it's box appurtenances ended the lays of the round bags and began that # the bales. I have never read or leard anything of the inventor of the crew, and if anyone knows its history
 hope he will tell 1t, because consider hat inventor as second only to the in- 'entor of the gin. That invention gave otton another impetus, because it | nore of it could be transported in the anne space, and thus largely increas- ng the cargoes for northern and for ign markets. The square bales aver ged at least four hundred and fifty ounds, and from that to five hundred r five hundred and twenty-five. Then anne railroad transportation and the 1vention of the compress, whereby the utter cotton could be placed in yet mailer compass. which further in- reased it's production without dimin- thing its average price. Thus the cot on belt of the south grew rich as the fleet of the gin, screw, compress and ailroad until in 1860 and 1861 able-bod- l d men slaves averaged one thousand ollars, and the average land twenty [ ollars per acre, not to include the rich ! .nds of the Mississippi and its tributa- ' es, where lands and slaves were large more valuable.
 Sir John Seeley and "LEcce Homo"