SECRETARY'S REPORT. 93 



infinitely greater consequence, delays and retards the whole 

 progress of agriculture. 



The improvement in instruments for separating grain has not 

 been less marked than those by which it is harvested. The 

 wants of American farmers in this department of agricultural 

 labor have been wisely and successfully studied. It is not 

 many years since the best means of threshing grain was by the 

 use of the old-fashioned flail, — a slow and laborious process. I 

 have even seen wheat and oats trodden out by oxen after the 

 method of the ancients, and I have myself driven the oxen for 

 this purpose many a day, not merely to try it as a matter of 

 experiment, but in real earnest, as if it were the best method 

 in the world. But what a waste of time and labor 1 We can 

 hardly conceive how any farmer can afford to use these slow 

 methods ; and yet such is the tenacity of habit, that some are 

 still found treading contentedly in the old paths, while improve- 

 ments go on unnoticed around them. 



At the trial of threshing machines at the Paris Exposition, 

 the victory was won by an American machine, and during the 

 operation, to ascertain the comparative rapidity of threshing, 

 six men were engaged in threshing with flails, who, in one hour, 

 threshed sixty litres of wheat. In the same time 



Pitt's American machine threshed 740 litres of wheat. 

 Clayton's English " " 410 " " 



Duvoir's French " " 250 " " 



Pinet's French " " 150 " " 



And a French journal, in speaking of the trial, said : " This 

 American machine literally devoured the sheaves of wheat. 

 The eye cannot follow the work which is effected between the 

 entrance of the sheaves and the end of the operation. It is 

 one of the greatest results which it is possible to obtain. The 

 impression which this spectacle produced on the Arab chiefs 

 was profound." 



Machines for threshing are capable, if properly made, of 

 doing the work of fifteen men. 



Tliese vast improvements in harvesting and threshing grain 

 will seem to be of the utmost importance, when it is considered 

 that we annually raise more than one hundred and seventy-five 

 millions of bushels of wheat, and of rye, barley and oats, over 

 one hundred millions, and that the resources of the country 

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