We receive great quantities of cotton from America, and the East and West Indies. The whole quantity imported into this country, in the year 1802, exceeded 60,000,000 pounds' weight; whilst the average annual importation, anterior to 1780, did not amount to one tenth part of this; so rapid has been the increase and prosperity of our cotton manufactories. Calicoes and muslins of all kinds are made of cotton; fustians, corderoys, and innumerable other articles. Nankeens, which are manufactured in India, are made of a kind of cotton which is naturally of a reddish buff colour. After the cotton is imported into England, the first process which it goes through is that of _carding_. Some years ago, this was performed by the hand, upon the knee, with a single pair of cards; but it is now performed with cylindrical cards, worked by machinery. The next and most important improvements in the manufacture of cotton, were made at Cromford, in the county of Derby, by the late Sir Richard Arkwright; who, in 1768, first introduced the method of _spinning_ cotton by machinery. By this contrivance cotton was _carded_, _roved_, and _spun_, with the utmost expedition, correctness, and equality. Other machines have, at different subsequent periods, been invented by various mechanics and manufacturers, particularly that called a _jenny_, by which one person is able to spin a hundred hanks of cotton yarn a-day, containing, in the whole, near a million of yards. The concluding operation is that of weaving, which is performed with a machine called a loom, in the same manner as flax (97) and hemp (259). Cotton is capable of being manufactured into paper, which is little inferior to that made from linen rags. ---- CLASS XVII.--DIADELPHIA. ---- DECANDRIA. 193. _The COMMON BROOM_ (Spartium scoparium) _is a shrub common on sandy pastures and heaths in nearly all the southern parts of England; and is distinguished by having large, yellow, butterfly-shaped flowers, leaves in threes, and single, and the branches angular._ Few of our wild plants are applicable to more numerous purposes of domestic utility than this. Its _twigs_ are tied in bundles, and formed into brooms. Some persons roast the _seeds_, and make them into a kind of coffee. The fibrous and elastic parts of the _bark_, after having been separated by soaking in water, may be manufactured into cordage, matting, and even into a coarse kind of cloth. The twigs and young branches have been successfully employed as a substitute for oak bark, in the tanning of leather. They may also be rendered serviceable as thatch for houses, and corn ricks; and some persons mix them with hops in brewing; but it is doubtful whether, in this respect, they are wholesome. The _flower buds_, when pickled, have occasionally been used as a substitute for capers.