A popular, illustrated account of cotton from the plant to the spun yarn, by the director of the Bolton textile school. It covers the plant's origin, myths such as the Vegetable Lamb of Tartary, species, diseases and pests, and cultivation in the United States, Brazil, Peru, India, Russia, China and Egypt. It then treats the microscopic structure of the fibre, ginning and baling, the machine processes of opening, scutching, carding, drawing, roving and combing, the history of spinning from the distaff through Hargreaves, Arkwright and Crompton, mule and ring spinning, and the uses of the yarn. Illustrated with photographs and drawings of plants and machinery, with an index.