MORRIS BIRKBECK, ESQ. 



ever will save his bones labour. The water, the wind, the fire ; 

 any thing that will help him. Cattle of some sort or other were, 

 for a long while, his great resource. But, of late, water-powers, 

 wind-powers, fire-powers. And, indeed, wondrous things have 

 been performed by machines of this kind. The water and the 

 wind do not eat, and require no grooming. But, it sometimes 

 happens, that, when all things are considered, we resort to these 

 grand powers without any necessity for it ; and that we forget 

 how easily we could do the thing we want done, with our own 

 hands. The story, in Peregrine Pickle, about the Mechanic, 

 who had invented a water machine to cut off the head of a cabbage, 

 hardly surpassed the reality in the case of the machine, brought 

 out in England, some years ago, for reaping wheat : nor is it much 

 less ridiculous to see people going many miles with grist to a mill, 

 which grist they might so easily grind at home. The hand- 

 mills, used in England, would be invaluable with you, for a while, 

 at least. 



1032. But, it is of a mill of more general utility, that I am now 

 about to speak to you ; and, I seriously recommend it to your 

 consideration, as well as to other persons similarly situated. 



1033. At Botley I lived surrounded by water-mills and wind 

 mills. There were eight or ten within five miles of me, and one 

 at two hundred yards from my house. Still I thought, that it 

 was a brutal sort of thing to be ob iged to send twice to a mill, 

 with all the uncertainties of the business, in order to have a sack of 

 wheat or of barley ground. I sent for a mill-wright, and, after 

 making all the calculations, I resolved to have a mill in my farm 

 yard, to grind for myself, and to sell my wheat in the shape of 

 flour. I had the mill erected in a pretty little barn, well floored 

 with oak, and standing upon stones with caps : so that no rats or 

 mice could annoy me. The mill was to be moved by horses for 

 which, to shelter them from the wet, I had a shed with a circular 

 roof erected on the outside of the barn. Under this roof, as well 

 as I recollect, there was a large wheel, which the horses turned 

 and a bar, going from that wheel, passed through into the barn, 

 and there it put the whole machinery in motion. 



1034. 1 have no skill in mechanics. I do not, and did not, know 

 one thing from another by its name. All I looked to was the 

 effect : and this was complete. I had excellent flour. All my 

 meal was ground at home. I was never bothered with sending 

 to the mill. My ear^ were never after dinned with complaints 

 about bad flour and heavy bread. It was the prettiest, most con 

 venient, and most valuable thing I had upon my farm. It was, 

 I think, put up in 1816, and this was one of the pleasures, from 

 which the Borough-villains (God confound them !) drove me in 

 1817. I think it cost me about a hundred pounds. I forget, 

 whether I had sold any flour from it to the Bakers. But, inde 

 pendent of that it was very valuable. I think we ground and 

 dressed about forty bushels of wheat in a day : and, we used to 



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