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Note C—Page 90.
For the following valuable paper upon the cultivation of cotton,
the author is indebted to the kindness of Dr. J. W. Monett,
of Mississippi, already well known to the medical world by his
treatises published at the north upon the prevailing epidemics of
this climate.
THE COTTON CROP.
“Having finished or relinquished the miscellaneous business of
winter, such as clearing, building, ditching, and splitting rails,
the hands are actively employed in making preparation for another
crop. The first thing to be attended to, is the repairing of
all the fences, with the light force, such as boys and women;
while the strong hands are employed in chopping, and log-rolling
in the new grounds. These operations are commenced generally
about the middle of February, and continued two or three weeks,
unless the farm is mostly new; in which case the clearing of the
new ground continues four or five weeks until it is time to plant
corn, generally from the first to the twentieth of March. During
all this time several ploughs, in a well opened place, are kept
constantly running (unless prevented by rain), in “listing up”
corn and cotton ground. The distance between the ridges for
cotton varies according to the strength of the soil, and the consequent
size to which the plant grows. In the rich bottoms the
distance between the middle or tops of the ridges must be from
five to seven feet; while in the thin upland soil, a space of three
or four feet is amply sufficient. In the latter soil, the cotton
plant attains the height of three or four feet, and branches laterally
about half that distance. But in the rich alluvial lands, the stalk
not unfrequently shoots up to six and eight feet, and branches so
as to interlock with the other rows six or eight feet apart.
Early in April, and sometimes even in the last days of March,
the cotton-planting commences. To open the ridges, a narrow
plough is run by one horse along the middle of the ridge, so as to
open a narrow shallow furrow, in the mellow ground first
ploughed. Immediately behind the opening plough, follows the
sower, with his sack of cotton-seed suspended from his neck,
walking at the same pace with the plough-man before. At every
step or two he throws the seed so as to strew it four or five feet
sown is often unnecessarily large, being frequently twenty times
more numerous than the stalks permitted to remain growing.
This profusion of seed is sown for the purpose of obtaining a
“good stand,” after allowing for defective seeds as well as some
which may not be covered, and others that may be covered too
deep, and also for many plants that may sicken and die after they
have vegetated and come above the ground. This latter circumstance
frequently occurs: a stand may be amply sufficient when
first up, but from drought, excessive rain, or chilling winds, one
half in the rows, and sometimes whole acres together, die with
the “rust,” “sore skin,” or “yellow fever.”
After the sower another hand follows closely with a light horse
harrow, drawn over the furrow, for the purpose of covering the
seed. This throws in the loose earth over the seed, and covers
them so lightly that often one-third of them are still visible, yet
this covering is sufficient, for no seeds require less covering than
cotton-seed. They will sprout and take root, when left on the
surface of the ground, if a slight shower follows.
On a large plantation where there are, say, fifty effective
hands, there will probably be three or four sets of hands engaged
at the same time in planting; each set, however, not in any way
interfering with the other; but all pushing on with a constant
brisk motion. As a medium task, each set, of three hands, will
very easily plant ten acres, but oftener fifteen in old well broken
land. During the planting season, or between the first of April
and the middle of May, there are always from one to three wet or
rainy spells, continuing from one to four days each, so that the
planting is necessarily interrupted. This, however, is an advantage
which none complain of, as it facilitates and expedites
the vegetation of the seed already planted; while it causes the
several portions of the crop to vary eight or ten days in age, and
thereby renders the working more convenient. Twenty planting
days are sufficient to put in the whole cotton crop, or at least as
much as can be properly tended and secured. On the rich bottom
lands, when the growth of the cotton is very luxuriant, it is desirable
to finish planting always before the first of May; but in
the hills, especially where the soil is thin, and the cotton plant
attains but a small comparative size, it is preferable to plant between
thus planted in thin soil, will mature and open as soon as that
which has been planted three weeks sooner in bottom lands.
When the earth is moist and warm, cotton-seed will sprout,
and be up in about five or six days; but if the soil be dry it takes
much longer—or until there is rain sufficient to saturate the loose
earth: for the seed, being covered with a thick coat of coarse
wool, is not so readily, as some other seeds, acted upon by slight
moisture. As the plant first comes out of the ground, it has
somewhat the appearance of a young bean, or of the okra plant,
being composed at first of two lobate leaflets, which continue,
gradually enlarging, until about the end of the first week, when
a leaf or two begins to put out between the lobules. The young
cotton-plant is extremely tender, and sensible to the most moderate
degrees of cold: the slightest frost cuts it off—while it
withers and dies from the effects of a few hours of chilling winds.
From the profusion of seed planted, the cotton plant of course
comes up very thick and crowded in the row; in which condition
it is allowed to remain a week or ten days, and often of necessity
much longer, when it is thinned out, or as it is called, “scraped.”
During scraping time there is one constant rush, and every hand
that can use a hoe is brought into the field. The process of
scraping commences by running a light furrow close on each side
of the row of young cotton, with the share of the plough next it,
so as to throw the dirt from the cotton and trim off the scattering
plants: the space left unbroken between these two furrows is
about eight or ten inches wide, ready for the hoes. If there are
many hoe-hands there are several ploughs “barring off” as it is
called. The hoe hands follow close upon the ploughs, each hand
upon a separate row, and with hoes sharp, and set particularly for
“scraping.” Experienced cotton hands run over the rows with
great rapidity, and evince great dexterity in striking out all to a
single stalk, which is left at the distance, from its next neighbour,
of at least the width of the hoe; and in bottom land, at double that
distance. Thus, in thin land, the stalks are desired to be ten or
twelve inches apart, and in the rich lands about eighteen or twenty
inches, in the row. The cotton plant thus thinned out, continues
to grow slowly until the hot weather of June sets in, when it begins
to grow rapidly, putting out a blossom at each new joint
until frost puts a stop to the growth of the plant, which is generally
in October. The pericarp or boll of cotton, from the first
bloom, is generally matured in eight or ten weeks, when it begins
to crack at the four seams in the bolls, until the four valves
spread wide open, remaining attached only at the base or extremity
next the stem. When the valves are thus open, the cotton
with the seed, to which it adheres in a kind of cluster, hangs
down from one to four inches. From June until October, the
cotton exhibits a successive and continued florescence, while the
plant is loading itself with green bolls, from the size of a young
peach, having just dropped its blossom, to that of a small hen's
egg. About the last of August the matured bolls begin to burst
or open their valves and suspend their cotton; and from that
time the plant exhibits at the same time, blossoms, and bolls of
every size, and every stage of maturity. Toward fall, when the
heat of the sun is constant and intense, the bolls will mature and
open in six weeks from the blossom.
After the first “scraping out,” the cultivation is carried on
much in the same manner as in the cultivation of corn, until
about the first of August, when it ceases, and the crop is laid by.
The same kind of cultivation that would make good corn would
make good cotton. In this however there is a difference of
opinion: some will hill, or heap the earth up in high ridges with
both corn and cotton, while others will keep the soil loose and
level about both; the latter is decidedly the proper mode for
either.
When the blossom is first unfolded, which generally occurs in
the night, in form it resembles the white hollyhock, but is
smaller, and is of a faint yellowish white colour, which it retains
until about noon; the heat of the sun then being intense, the
corolla partially closes, not unlike the four-o'clock-flower, and at
the same time its hue is changed to a delicate rose, or lilac. On
the following day the flowers become more deeply tinged; toward
the close of the second evening they are of a deep crimson,
or violet hue. During the succeeding night, and morning,
that is, about forty-eight hours after they first open, they always
drop off, while of a deep violet colour, leaving the young capsule
or boll. The blossoms generally open, as well as fall off, during
August, September, and October, exhibits the singular appearance
of a continued crop of opening, closing, and falling blossoms,
with an almost equal mixture of white, lilac, and purple
flowers; while each morning the ground is seen covered with the
latter, and the branches replenished with the white.
As the ploughing generally ceases and the crop is “laid by”
about the last of July, when the plant is large and brittle, there
is but little done in the field during the first three weeks in August,
except that a few light hands are kept employed in cutting,
or pulling up the “tie-vines” which are sometimes very troublesome:
the tie-vine is nothing more or less than the morning-glory,
so carefully cultivated in gardens at the north, for the purpose
of shading arbours and summer houses.
Toward the last of August, or as soon as there is sufficient
open cotton for a hand to pick fifteen or twenty pounds during the
day, the light force, consisting of women and children, is put to
picking for a week or ten days; when there being sufficient cotton
opened, to make a full day's work, all hands are engaged without
exception. Then begins another push, which continues until
the whole crop is gathered and housed. During “picking time”
which continues where full crops are made until the first of December,
and in river lands, until the first of January, the hands
are regularly roused, by a large bell or horn, about the first dawn
of day, or earlier so that they are ready to enter the field as soon
as there is sufficient light to distinguish the bolls. As the dews
are extremely heavy and cool, each hand is provided with a blanket
coat or wrapper, which is kept close around him until the dew is
partially evaporated by the sun. Without this protection they
would be completely wet from head to feet, in a very short time;
and as they would be in the field at least two hours before the
sun's rays would be felt, they would be perfectly chilled, if no
worse consequence attended. The hands remain in the field until
it is too dark to distinguish the cotton, having brought their
meals with them. For the purpose of collecting the cotton, each
hand is furnished with a large basket, and two coarse cotton bags
about the size of a pillow case, with a strong strap to suspend them
from the neck or shoulders. The basket is left at the end of a row,
and both bags taken along: when one bag is as full as it can well
the second in the same way. As soon as the second is full, he returns
to the basket, taking the other bag as he passes it, and empties
both into the basket, treading it down well, to make it contain his
whole day's work. The same process is repeated until night;
when the basket is taken upon his head and carried to the scaffold-yard,
to be weighed. There the overseer meets all hands at the
scales, with the lamp, slate, and whip. On the left hand margin
of the slate is pasted a strip of paper, with the name of each written
in fair large hand. As soon as their baskets are set upon the
ground, the weighing commences. Each basket is carefully
weighed, and the nett weight of cotton set down upon the slate,
opposite the name of the picker. The negroes stand round, to remove
and replace the baskets as they are weighed; and occasionally
the countenance of an idler may be seen to fall. Then is the time
for the overseer to watch close or he may be greatly imposed upon
by the cunning and lazy, who are apt, in the crowd, to prevent
their baskets from being weighed, by substituting a heavier one
which has been passed, or they may fill up their baskets from
one already weighed. Sometimes a negro, known to be lazy, will
have heavy weight and will probably extort from the overseer
expressions of praise and encouragement, unless he examines the
basket, when perchance he may find one of his sacks full of moist
earth snugly covered up at the bottom; such tricks as these will
be continually practised upon an overseer, who is careless or
“soft;” a quality or character, which none can more readily and
properly appreciate than the negro. It is not an uncommon occurrence
for an overseer, who is even vigilant, amid the crowd of negroes
and baskets, with only one lamp, held close to the scales
and slate, to weigh some of the heavier baskets several times, their
exact weight being changed by taking out, or putting in a few
pounds; while the lighter ones pass entirely unnoticed. No
inconvenience arises to any one from such incidents, except that
the crop is not gathered in as good time as it might otherwise
have been, and a portion consequently is wasted.
After the weighing is over, and the baskets are emptied, or
turned bottom upward, upon the scaffolds, the overseer takes the
slate, and examines the weights attached to each name. Those
who are found to have brought in less than their usual quantity,
the individual advances, and if his reasons are insufficient, he is
ordered to lie down upon his face, with his back exposed; when
he receives ten, twenty, or fifty stripes with the whip, according
to his deserts. In this way the overseer goes over the list, punishing
only those who have idled away their time.
No one knows that he is to be punished until his name is called,
when he has an opportunity of giving his reasons for his imperfect
day's work. As to the quantity which a hand can pick in a
day, there is a great difference; some will pick only from 75 to
100 lbs., others from 150 to 200 lbs., while some extraordinary
pickers can pick as high as 4 or 500 lbs. in one day. But to pick
these last weights requires such brisk and incessant motion, that
it could not be done two days in succession without danger of life
or health; and is only attempted for a wager, or such like reason.
The average weight picked by all the hands on a place, will seldom
exceed 150 or 160 lbs., in good picking. Children from ten
to fifteen years of age generally pick nearly as much as grown
hands. The scaffolds for drying cotton are mostly temporary, being
made anew every summer, of common boards or plank. Upon
these the cotton is suffered to lie spread out to the sun, at least one
day to dry; while some old or decrepid hand stays at the scaffold,
to turn and spread it, as well as to pick out leaves and trash.
It may not be improper to make a remark or two relative to
whipping. This is generally performed with as much care and
humanity as the nature of the case will admit. A person standing
at the distance of two hundred yards, being unacquainted with
the mode, and hearing the loud sharp crack of the whip upon the
naked skin, would almost tremble for the life of the poor sufferer.
But what would be his surprise, after hearing fifty or one hundred
stripes thus laid on, to go up and examine the poor fellow, and
find the skin not broken, and not a drop of blood drawn from him!
Yet this is the way in which the whip is generally used here upon
slaves: very few planters would permit them to be whipped on
the bare back with a raw-hide, or cow-skin, as it is called.
Though, as in every thing else, there is a great difference in the
degree of severity exercised by different masters: yet we must
take the general rule, as applicable to the great class of planters.
The common overseer's whip consists of a stout flexible stalk,
large at the handle, tapering rapidly to the distance of about
whole is covered with a leather plat, which continues tapering
into, and forms the lash—the whole together being about three
feet and a half long. To the end of the lash is attached a soft,
dry, buckskin cracker, about three eighths of an inch wide and ten
or twelve inches long, which is the only part allowed to strike, in
whipping on the bare skin. So soft is the cracker, that a person
who has not the sleight of using the whip, could scarcely hurt a
child with it. When it is used by an experienced hand it makes a
very loud report, and stings, or “burns” the skin smartly, but does
not bruise it. One hundred lashes well laid on with it, would not
injure the skin as much as ten moderate stripes with a cow-skin.
But to return from this digression:—Every day, when the weather
will admit, beholds a repetition of the ceremony of picking,
weighing, and drying, as before detailed. Those who have gins,
as all planters should have, generally keep the stand running during
the picking season, so as to gin out the cotton as fast as it is
picked. If there are forty or fifty good pickers, it requires one
stand to be kept running constantly to keep up with them. In
such cases, during wet weather, when the hands cannot pick
cotton, the ablest of them are kept baling the cotton which has
been ginned since the last rain, or within the last eight or ten
days. When there are not more than twenty, or twenty-five, the
gin will be able to keep up, by ginning the last three days in the
week, in addition to all rainy weather; and the able-bodied hands
will be able to do all the pressing and baling during the wet days.
Gin, in the common acceptation, signifies the house and all the
machinery required to separate the lint from the seed, and to press
it into large bales, weighing generally from 400 to 500 pounds.
The house is a large enclosed roof, resting upon blocks or posts,
which support it at about eight or nine feet from the ground.
The common area covered is about forty by sixty feet, the rafters
resting upon plates, and the plates upon flooring beams, or joists,
upon which the floor is laid. About the distance of one-third the
length of the house, two gearing beams are laid across, for supporting
the machinery. These rest upon the top of the blocks,
or on posts framed into them. On the ground floor is the horse-path
for drawing the main wheel and counter wheel; the last of
which carries a broad band, which passes over and turns the cylinder
and brush of the gin-stand alone. The large plantations
and expensive buildings, in which are placed two, three, or four
stands. A gin-stand is a frame, in which runs a wooden cylinder
with an iron shaft running through it; this cylinder is encircled
at every inch by a very thin circular saw, with sharp hooked teeth,
upon which the seed cotton is thrown, running through parallel
grates. The teeth of the saws catch and carry through the lint
from the seed. Just behind the cylinder is a fly-wheel brush—
that is, a fan, with a brush on its extreme circumference; this
brush, running considerably faster than the cylinder, takes off the
cotton from the teeth, and blows it back. The space or room
above is divided into two apartments; one for the stand and seed
cotton, and the other for ginned cotton; the latter of which will
contain cotton for twenty or thirty bales. A good gin-stand, with
sixty or sixty-five saws, running constantly from daybreak in the
morning until eight or nine o'clock at night, will gin out as
much as will make three or four bales.
At the other end of the house, and immediately under the room
containing ginned cotton, is the press. It consists of two large
wooden screws, twelve or sixteen inches in diameter, with reversed
threads cut on each end to within eighteen inches or two
feet of the middle, through which there is a mortice for the lever.
These screws stand perpendicularly, and about ten feet apart, and
work into a large heavy beam above, and into another firmly secured
below. The upper moves up or down (when the screws
are turned), between four strong upright posts, framed together,
two on each side, so as to come down strait and steady when
pressing.
The lower sides of the press are composed of very strong batten
doors; when the beam is brought sufficiently low, a spring is
struck, and they fly open; when they are removed, leaving the
naked bale standing on its edge under the press. A piece
of bagging, cut to the proper size and shape, was put in the bottom
of the press-box, before filling in the cotton, and another
on top, immediately under the follower. These two pieces are
brought together in such manner as to cover the cotton neatly,
and there sewed with twine. The rope passed under and over it,
through the grooves left in the bed-sill and in the follower, by
loop knots. When all is finished, the screws are turned backward,
the beam rises, and the bale is rolled out. Notwithstanding
there are seven bands of strong rope around it, the bale will
swell and stretch the rope, until its breadth is at least two or three
inches more than when in the press. To press and bale expeditiously
requires at least four or five hands and one horse. When
the box has been sufficiently filled, generally eight or nine feet
deep, the men bring down the beam by turning the screws with
hand levers as long as they can turn them; then a large lever is
placed in the screw, with a strong horse attached to one end, and
a few turns of the screws by the horse bring the beam down to
the proper point, within thirty or thirty-four inches of the sill.
The requisite number of hands will put up and bale with a
common press about ten or twelve bales a day, by pushing. After
the bales are properly put up, the next thing is to mark and number
them on one end. For this purpose a plate of copper, with
the initials, or such mark as is fancied, cut in it, is applied to the
end of the bale and the letters and figures painted through it with
black marking ink.
The next trouble is to haul them to market, or the nearest landing
for boats; sometimes this is a very troublesome and difficult
task, especially in wet weather, when the roads, from the immense
quantity of heavy bauling, in getting the crops to market, are
much cut up, and often almost impassable. The planter who is
careful to take all proper advantages of season and weather, will
have his cotton hauled early in the fall, as fast as it is ginned, when
the roads are almost certainly good.
The quantity of cotton produced to the acre, varies with the
quality of the soil and the season. The best kind of river and
alluvial lands, when in a complete state of cultivation, and with
a good season, will produce on an average from 1500 to 2000 lbs.
of cotton in the seed per acre; while new land of the same quality
will not yield more than 1200 or 1400 lbs. per acre. The highlands,
where the soil is fertile, will yield under the most favourable
circumstances about 1400 lbs., while those lands which have
been many years in cultivation, where the soil is thin, will not
yield more than from 800 to 1000 lbs. per acre; and some not
cotton, will, when ginned out, make a bale of 400 lbs. or more.
This is according to the correct weight of the daily picking in the
cotton book; although after being weighed, it must lose some
weight by drying.
The quantity of cotton raised and secured by good management
most commonly averages about five or six bales to the hand:
and the quantity, among the mass of planters, more frequently
falls below, than rises above this estimate. Some, with a few
choice hands, may sometimes average nine or ten bales to the
hand by picking until January.
When the crop is all secured, which, as we observed before,
varies from the first of December until some time in January, according
to the season, hands, and extent of the crop, the hands are
employed during the winter in clearing, chopping logs in the
field, splitting rails, or ditching, if necessary. About the middle
of February they resume preparations for “another crop.”
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