ich the
young one is growing. There is a great difference between a wet soil and
a moist one, and there is perhaps nothing so much dreaded by the
planters as a sodden soil. Up to the end of July the soil should be
continuously and uniformly moist, and it would appear that, provided
this condition is satisfied, there is every likelihood of a heavy crop
resulting, if the temperature has been anything like suitable. Looked at
from every point of view, therefore, the best and safest soil in which
to grow cotton is a deep loam where there is every probability of the
necessary conditions being fulfilled.

As compared with sixty years ago the present methods of cultivation
show very great differences. Most of us are acquainted with the
conditions of labour which existed at that time. Mrs. H. Beecher Stowe,
in her pathetic and life-like story, "Uncle Tom's Cabin," has given us
such a glimpse into slave life that she has placed us all under lasting
obligations to her. Happily all that has gone and the slave, as such, is
now known no more in America. Three causes are said to have done more to
change the methods of American cotton cultivation than anything else,
viz.:--

The Civil War.
The abolition of slavery.
Introduction of artificial fertilisers.

There are those who affirm to-day that the last-named has been the most
potent factor of the three.

In many cases, previous to the war, crop after crop was grown upon the
same land without any thought of returning those elements, in the form
of manure, to the earth, which it so much required. But immediately
after the conclusion of the war, the conditions of labour were changed
and it became a matter of absolute necessity to find something which
would give life to the land, hence the introduction of fertilisers. It
is stated on the authority of Dr. White of Georgia, that it would be
"difficult to conceive how cotton culture could have been continued or
sustained but for the use of such manures."

In a work of this kind it is impossible to describe in detail the
various methods of cultivation adopted in the several cotton States, but
the following will give a fair idea of what actually takes place on a
large cotton plantation, assuming that the land is well drained. It
should be said here draining has not received that attention which it
ought to have done, and many of the failures put down to other causes
are now known to have been due entirely to bad drainage. As an
a