With the consideration of cotton seed oil and meal we have not, however, exhausted its possibilities. Cotton seed hulls constitute about half the weight of the ginned seed. After the seed of Upland cotton has been passed through a fine gin, which takes off the short lint or linters left upon it by the farmer, it is passed through what is called a sheller, consisting of a revolving cylinder, armed with numerous knives, which cut the seed in two and force the kernels or meats from the shells. The shells and kernels are then separated in a winnowing machine. This removal of the shell makes a great difference in the oilcake, as the decorticated cake is more nutritious than the undecorticated. For a long time these shells or hulls, as they are called, were burned at oil mills for fuel, 2½ tons being held equal to a cord of wood, and 4-1/3 tons to a ton of coal. The hulls thus burned produced an ash containing an average of 9% of phosphoric acid and 24% of potash--a very valuable fertilizer in itself, and one eagerly sought by growers of tobacco and vegetables. It was not long, however, before the stock-feeder in the South found that cotton seed hulls were an excellent substitute for hay. They are used on a very large scale in the vicinity of oil mills in southern cities like Memphis, New Orleans, Houston, and Little Rock, from 500 to 5000 cattle being often collected in a single yard for this purpose. No other feed is required, the only provision necessary being an adequate supply of water and an occasional allowance of salt. Many thousands of cattle are fattened annually in this way at remarkably low cost.
Careful attention is now given to the employment of the seed in new cotton countries, and oil expression is practised in the West Indies. Hull is the principal seat of the industry in Great Britain, and enormous quantities of Indian and Egyptian cotton seed are imported and worked up.
The following diagram, modified from one by Grimshaw, in accordance with the results obtained by the better class of modern mills, gives an interesting _résumé_ of the products obtained from a ton of cotton seed:--
Cotton seed, 2000 pounds. +------+------------------------+------ | | | | Linters, 23 pounds. | | ------------------- | | | Meats, 1090 pounds. Hulls, 888 pounds. --------+-----------+---- +---+------+----- | | | | | Cake, 800 pounds. | | | | ---+---------------+ | | | | | | | | Meal. | Fibre. | | Bran. -----------------------------+ -----+----+ | --+-- (Feeding stuff. Fertilizer.)| | | | -----------------------------+ | | | | ----------+--------+------+------- Crude oil, 290 pounds. (High-grade paper.)|(Cattle food.) -----+-------+-------- -------------------+-------------- | | | Summer Yellow. |Soap stock. (Fuel.) | +--------+------------ +--+-------- ---+-------+-------+ |(Winter | Cotton seed | | | |yellow | stearin.) Soaps. Ashes. | +--------+----------- ------ --+--- -----+------- | | (Cattle food) | | with the meal. | Salad oil. Fertilizer. | +------------------- These together, | Summer white. a very valuable +-------+----------- manure. | | | Lard. | +-------+ | | Cottolene (with beef stearin, cooking oil). +-------------------------------------------- | | Miners' oil. +------------- | | Soap. +------