A Modest Industry.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume IX, Issue 2960, 26 July 1888, Page 2

A Modest Industry.

lii allusion to the cotton seed oil, the Atlanta Constitution, says that for almost a century ibis product of the cotton Held was regarded as a nuisance only to bo got rid of in llio easiest \ manner practicable. It was burned; • it-was thrown,into tho rivers; it was put anywhere so that it could be removed. Thou it was found that it ' was valuablo for manure; next, that it made good food for cattle; then suddenly it was discovered that tho seed could have oil extracted from it which yielded 11 dollars to tho ton or tho enormous total of 40,000,000 dol. for the seed from one year's cotton crop of the South—and this had been thrown away year after year for gen- A erations. The next development was a great step in advance-iu prico. It was found that cotton seed oil, when v' refined, put in' little' bottles and pro- V perly labelled could not be told from the genuine Italian " huile d'olive." This was a bonanza, and tho yaluo of tho cotton seed at once took an upward jump, until now it is hard to tell how many millions of dollars it brings in. The product of the olive orchards of'jffify quadrupled at a step, without the setting of another tree, and everybody was happy, even the gommand, who "was so dreadfully fond of pure olive oil, you know." But there is more to come. Tho "pure-lard" makers of Chicago ran short of diseased hogs and refuse tallow and other appetising l substances which they had been wont to convert into" lard," and they oast longing looks to the source of tho olive oil. They found some means of solidifying the cotton seed product, . and now it cuts no small figuro in tho , A lard factories of Chicago and else. '3 whoie. But the end is not yet. Some-. I ~W one has found that all the processes for expressing the oil from tho seed are faulty, and a methodhas just been patented hy which 40 per cent mora oil can be secured than has hitherto been the case. And so the thing goes ' on, and if many more discoveries, arcmade it would not be surprising to find the oil from tho seed of more value than the staplo jtself. Yerily, gwat is Amerwaningeiwity I