228 NATURE NEAR LONDON. 



of this plough not the designer the various makers, 

 who gradually put it together, had many things to 

 consider. The fields where it had to work were, for 

 the most part, on a slope, often thickly strewn with 

 stones which jar and fracture iron. 



The soil was thin, scarce enough on the upper part 

 to turn a furrow, deepening to nine inches or so at 

 the bottom. So quickly does the rain sink in, and 

 so quickly does it dry, that the teams work in almost 

 every weather, while those in the vale are enforced to 

 idleness. Drain furrows were not needed, nor was it 

 desirable that the ground should be thrown up in 

 " lands," rising in the centre. Oxen were the draught 

 animals, patient enough, but certainly not nimble. 

 The share had to be set for various depths of soil. 



All these are met by the wheel plough, and in addi- 

 tion it fulfils the indefinite and indefinable condition 

 of handiness. A machine may be apparently perfect, 

 a boat may seem on paper, and examined on principles, 

 the precise build, and yet when the one is set to work 

 and the other floated they may fail. But the wheel 

 plough, having grown up, as it were, out of the soil, 

 fulfils the condition of handiness. 



This handiness, in fact, embraces a number of 

 minor conditions which can scarcely be reduced to 

 writing, but which constantly occur in practice, and 

 by which the component parts of the plough were 

 doubtless unconsciously suggested to the makers. 

 Each has its proper name. The framework on wheels 

 in front the distinctive characteristic of the plough 

 is called collectively " tacks," and the shafts of 

 the plough rest on it loosely, so that they swing or 



