20 THE WHEAT CULTTTRIST. 



showers of rain, upon condition that he would intro- 

 duce harmony, peace, and fellowship into social life by 

 the culture of straw-producing plants. 



" The culture of the wheat-bearing plant compelled 

 the cultivator to abandon the wild or nomadic life which 

 it is not unreasonable to suppose he must have led ; and 

 the time which otherwise would have been spent in 

 roaming through the forests, was now spent in contriv- 

 ing indispensable implements. First and prominent 

 among these were the plough and harrow — rude beyond 

 question in mechanical structure, and uncouth in ap- 

 pearance, yet they were the first peaceful, and at the 

 same time utilitarian products of civilization. 



" Thus has the culture of this straw-growing jplant 

 caused savages to abandon their barbarous customs — 

 has fixed in friendly communion many nomadic and 

 rival hordes — inaugurated the greatest era the world 

 ever saw, the era from which the human race may date 

 its incipient civilization — the era of labor. The continued 

 culture and increase of this plant has from the very 

 commencement called into action all the resources of 

 civilized nations. After the invention of the plough and 

 harrow, man's inventive genius was tasked to produce 

 a reaping hook or sickle ; and successively during the 

 many ages of the historic period has this plant called 

 into existence the scythe, the grain cradle, winnowing 

 machine, sowing machine, thrashing machine, and 

 within our own day and generation, the reaping ma- 

 chine. The prolificacy of this plant has brought into 

 existence the cart and the wagon in the earlier ages of 

 society, but in more recent ones it has demanded the 

 construction of turnpikes and macadamized roads 

 through the pathless wilderness ; that canals be dug to 



