The age-herald., 1897-09-05
ROUND OR
 SQUARE BALES

Way down south in the land or eot- ton,' there is a small internecine war which takes on more hostile app=arance as the cotton ginning season opens. It is between the old compress and the new combination cylindrical gin and com press-a war bstween the rectangular and the round cotton bale. The south produces annually a cotton crop worth anywhere between $250 900 and $400.- 1000, and yet the farmer who produces it is always crying hard times because the profits are diverted into other pockets than his. "ThP very crop which is our mainstay is at the same time the thing which keeps our noses to the grindstona of debt and privation," he says truth fully, and yet with seeming contradic- ton.
 To raise and houss a crop of cotton takes from the first of March to the last of November. To dispose of it after 1t Is harvested requires very often two or three additional months, during which time there is wary season of waiting for the demand to increase and prices to rise. While this waiting is going on storage and insurance must be paid on the staple in the warehouse of the msr- chant to whom the crop not infrequently has been already nortgaged in return Tor money loaned for the raising. That IS, in majority of cases, this storage IS du@; sometimes there is a. planter who has kept out of the hands of the com mission merchant, and so can afford to hold his own cotton, but he is the exc D. ton, not the rule.
 IT the planter gees to the bank to bor- row money he is answered with a shake or th@ head and the assurance that the bank cannot go into the cotton business -lt would savor too much of speculation. but With that same cotton as security Tn his warehouse the factor gets the money from the bank and lends it to the planter at his own rate of interest," and as the factors firm Is not humanitarian organization we may be sure that rate exceeds by goodly sum the expense and trouble to which he has put himself. ihere the cotton lies in the warehouse until opportunity orsnecessity forc=s the sale to eastern CT foreign buyers. What money is left after deductng storage. insurance and commissions is turned over to the planter, who must be thankful that it is no less, and grat sful also if his credit is ffieisntly sustained to allow him to borrow money to raise the coming crop.
 The question arises, why does he not sell his cotton directly to the mill buy CTS He is in no position to do this. for even If his crop bs not already mort gagged, these buyers stop in the towns ana critics, and the large majority of these towns have ordinances forbidding the seiilng of cotton from wagons on the streets. Thus ths farmer cannot drive HIS product into the city and sell it him selI' It must go through the hands of lactors and warehouse owners. And sliil another reason he cannot sell it thus IS that the mill buyers want ths big bales compressed to reduce the freight 1o ulstant manufacturing cities, and dhough the farmer gins and bales his cotton he cannot compress 1t. For this process 1t must go to the cities and towns: and here, if not befora, arises the slogan Tor storage and insurance.
 another and serious leakage to the planter is the "sampling' system now in vogue. The country merchant cuts open the end or the bale and takes therefrom rom two to three pounds of the white Heece an order to judge it's quality. This Is repeated by the graders, and it is use less tclstate that these four or five pounds are never returned 10 the bale but are clear loss to the farmer Five pounds or cotton sounds like a. mere bagatelle. puI multiply it by S0i bales and there is, 2, terrible leakage of 1,500 pounds. or aoout three bales to the farmer. And to somebody else this is a clean pickup IL mas been estimated that this pickup rom crop of S,000600 bales is worth at least $2,000,000. The farmer gets not one dime of this.
 What we wart is something to 20 netween us and the factor, something. that will enable us to do without a com mission nerchait," the farners have been saying for a long time. And this go- between many of them think they have found in the cylindrical gin and compress which has made its appearance in the last two years. This combination gin with its hopper and condenser and it's roller compress turns out bale, the con- tents of which are ready to go at orce to the spinners, and being compressed andr ready for Ehipment at once it can be bought by the mill buyers at the gin directly of the owners Thus is there no necessity of a factor to stand between and claim commissions. The loss by sampling is also reduced to a minimum fgure.- for the ginner extracts from the cotton as it flows from the condenser three handfuls at different stages of the bale. These certified samples are put into pocket prepared for them on the outside of the bale after it is sewed up in its osnaburg cover and there is no need for the opening of the bale by the merchant or grader.
 Thus at first blush it would seem that the millenium had dawned at last for the cotton planter. But the rose hue fades from the dream under the presen- tation of the old compress ss men. They claim that this cylindrical press, the machinery of which cannot be bought.