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hanced motive-power are especially noticeable. lu some cases tbe daily 

 task of these machines is stated at from 1,000 to 2,000 bushels of wheat 

 per day. Steam is the motive-power iu most of these cases, though 

 eighteen or twenty horses are often used, accompanied by gangs of 

 twenty or twenty-live men. The motive-power is generally furnished 

 entirely by the owner of the machine, with men enough to operate it. 

 Thrashing hands are paid higher wages than in the Eastern States; 

 engineers receive $4 per day and other hands from $1.50 to $3; feeders 

 and sack sewers, in Tuolumne Oouiity, get about $5. The farmer in 

 most cases boards the hands. The price per bushel for thrashing-and 

 separating wheat rauges from 4 to 10 cents per bushel. ISTo reports of 

 steam-thrashing have been received from Oregon, but the machines gen- 

 erally require a large amount of horse-power. The price paid the 

 thrasher is from 4 to 6 cents per bushel, but the total cost of the opera- 

 tion is often 10 cents, including the labor and motive-power furnished 

 by the farmer, the boarding of hands, &c. 



Eecapitulation. — Wheat is the great money-crop of the Middle, 

 Western, and Pacific States, and here its early marketing is often one 

 of the pressing necessities of the farmer. This requires that the grain 

 be thrashed and cleaned as speedily as possible ; hence machinery of 

 great efficiency and motive-power, especially steam-power, are found 

 most economical. It will be seen, by consulting the accompanying 

 tables, that the smallest total cost of thrashing wheat — 5.8 cents per 

 bushel — is found in California, where the most extensive machinery is 

 used. The greatest cost — 19.2 cents — is in South Carolina, where 

 steam-machinery is unknown, and where the planters, to a great extent, 

 thrash their own crops. In northern New England it ranges from 10 to 

 13 cents per bushel. In the Middle States it runs from 7.7 cents in 

 Pennsylvania to 10.5 in New Jersey. Maryland averages 6.8 cents. 

 The average increases to the southward, varying from 9.7 cents in 

 Virginia to 19.2 in South Carolina. The Gulf States range from 14.1 

 cents in Texas to 16 cents in Mississippi. The inland Southern States 

 from 8.7 cents in West Virginia to 12 cents in Arkansas. North of the 

 Ohio iviver and west of the Mississippi no State averages more than 7^ 

 cents, while in Nebraska the cost averages as low as 5.8 cents. On the 

 Pacific coast, California averages 5.8 cents and Oregon 6.4 cents. The 

 cost of thrashing oats is generally about half the cost of wheat, ranging 

 from 3.4 cents per bushel in Nebraska to 13.3 cents in Massachusetts. 

 In the Middle and Western States the general average is between 4 and 

 5 cents. 



