Eeed.] Report on Steam Cultivation. 123 



35?. an acre, leaves an outlay of 68?. 3*-. as the cost of the 

 improved outfalls for the drainag^e of the whole farm. . . . The 

 total outlay in four years was oil?. 5*-., and the return — l%h acres 

 of land at o5?. — 647?. lO^'. ; add the wood, 42?., making a total 

 of 689?. 10s. The expense of the new grass headland paths for 

 the steam-ploughing engines does not materially alter these 

 figures, for while 62 chains' length of new grass road bas been 

 laid down, 74 chains' length of old road has been ploughed up 

 and added to the arable ground. 



" This farm, once so foul, has been brought in four years into 

 the cleanly condition of a well-kept garden, and during the 

 last two years the whole has been ploughed and subsoiled 14 to 

 16 inches deep. When we visited it last November, the whole 

 of this year's wheat seeding (223 acres) was finished, all the 

 land for spring corn lay ready ploughed, and the land for roots 

 was in the same forward state, requiring only the harrow and 

 drill when sowing time should come, so that no heavy tillage of 

 any description remained to be done until after the present 

 harvest; and the perplexity of the manager was not, 'How shall 

 I be able to get through the spring and summer work due to a 

 large arable clay farm?' but, 'What new labour can I find to 

 employ my men throughout the winter and spring ? ' The former 

 occupiers are reported to have kept a score of horses at work in 

 tilling but 5 inches deep. IMr. Prout has done all his work Avith 10 

 horses and a 14-horse-power Fowler engine ; and having entirely 

 completed the reclamation, his intention is to reduce his force of 

 horse-flesh to only five good animals, which will suffice to cart the 

 corn into ricks beside the field roads ; they can manage this, 

 because 8 horses led the last harvest up to the homestead. The 

 amazing reduction in tillage expenditure from having a thoroughly 

 clean farm, further appears from the fact that, in future, the 

 engine, too, will have an easy time of it, as all its work will 

 occupy only about a couple of months during the entire year. 



" That Mr. Prout has not spent a fortune in eradicating weeds 

 and breaking up the soil to its present great depth of staple, is 

 proved by the labour-book. The cost of hand-labour, including 

 the wages of the steam-plough hands, the labour of stocking 

 hedges, and of all the drainage, was for the first year 726?., for 

 the second 1142?., the next 1020?., and for 1865 up to the 

 present time, 880?. The ordinary expense of 10 horses need not 

 be stated in figures ; but it is necessary to say what was the 

 total cost of working the steam-plough. The hand-labour is 

 included in the above amounts ; the water-cart horse Avas one of 

 the ten, and is now one of the five. The coals, at 16s. to 17s. 

 per ton, cost in 1861-2, 114?. ; in 1863, SQL ; in 1864-5, 165?. : 

 altogether, 365?. Oil, 6cc., cost 34?. in the 4 years. Repairs 



