The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-08-11

for easy figuring. make 675 million pounds or over 1,300.O GOO 5OO-pound bales. Egypt produces more cotton for it's size and the area planted than any other coun- try of the world. It's average crop is 49U pounds per acre. which is far in eN- cess of ours Dr. Webber of our depart ment of agriculture says that our aver age is only 19O pounds per acre, al though we have. of course, many acres which produce 800 pounds and more.
 Brings Big Prices.
 Egyption cotton brings big prices. There are some kinds which sell for double the amount of our cotton It is, in fact the best cotton of the world with the exception of the Sea Island cot ton, which grows on the islands off the coasts of Georgia and South Carolina The Sea Island cotton has little longer fibre than the Egyptian. The latter Is for the most part brown in color and is noted for its silkness, which makes it valuable for manufacturing mercerized cotton We import an enormous quan- tity of Egyptian cotton to mix with our cotton. hear of cotton here selling Ior 20 and 9 cents a pound, and am told that there Is a great difference In the varieties raised, and also to the parts of the Nile valley in which each kind is raised.
 The very best cotton grows in the deLa, and that region is now producing more than four-flfths of the crop. Less than quarter of a million acres are now in cotton in the valley of the Nile above Cairo. and the yield is neither so large nor so good as that of the delta.
 Eoypt's Cotton Plantations.
 l wish I could take you with me on a trip through the cotton fields of the Nile valley. The scenes there are nothing like those of our southern cities. Much Cf the cotton Is raised on small farms, and every field is marked out with little canals into which the water is intro duced from time to time. There are no great farm houses scattered over the landscape. and no barns. The people all live in mud villages and go out to work in the field. They use animals for blow ing and narrowing, and the crop is han died in different way. Let me give you few pictures as I have made them while travelling through the country.
 Take a look over the Delta It Is g1 wide expanse of green spotted here and there with white patches. The green con sists of alfalfa, Indian corn or beans. The white is the cotton. l can see It stretching out before me as far as my eye can reach
 Here is a field where the lint has been gathered. The land is black and it has
  it. Every stalk has been pulled out by the roots and piled up. Further on we see another field in which the stalks have been tied into bundles. They will be : sold fuel and will produce a full ton of dry wood to the acre. There are no foreces in Egypt, and all sorts of fuel are scarce. The stalks from one acre will sell for S2 more. The cotton stalks are used for cooking for the farm engInts on the larger plantations and even for running the ginning establishments. In that village over there you may see great bundles of stalks stored away on the ] top of the fat-roofed houses. Corn fodder is piled up beside them, the leaves of the fodder having been torn off for stock feed. Is not this a queer country where the people keep their wood piles on their roofsP
 Cotton Picking.
 Here Is field where they are picking cotton. There are scores of little Egypt ian boys and girls working away among the white bols. They have dark brown faces. The boys wear blue gowns and dirty white skull caps. The girls have cloths over their heads. All are bare- footed, and some of the boys are almost naked. They are picking the fiber in baskets and are paid so much per nun dred pounds. A boy will gather thirty or forty pounds in a day, and he does well if he earns as much as 10 cents