RURAL MANUFACTURES 309 



bushel in an evening.^ In preparing the virgin soil 

 for its first crop, '"The big A harrow with inch-square 

 teeth, drawn by two yoke of oxen, pulled out the 

 loose grubs and partially leveled the ground." - "The 

 land was broken up by the use of a very stout plow 

 and three or four — sometimes as many as seven — 

 yoke of oxen hitched one team ahead of another. 

 This stout plow was almost always a home-made 

 affair constructed of wood, excepting the coulter and 

 the share. ... I remember to have seen a plow with 

 a wooden mould-board and only one handle," writes 

 W. J. Beal, "Wood's patent was the first plow with 

 a cast-iron mould-board that I remember to have 

 seen or used. I have read of a prejudice among farm- 

 ers against using an iron plow on the ground that it 

 poisoned the laud for crops, but I never heard of this 

 among the farmers of southern Michigan." ^ The 

 forest was searched for a tree whose divided trunk 

 yielded the frame for the farmer's home-made drag. 

 "The selected tree was cut down," says Edward Bar- 

 ber, "the crotch severed from the trunk and the re- 

 mainder of the top. The oxen hauled it to the house. 

 The limbs were hewed on four sides with an ordi- 

 nary axe, holes bored through them for the teeth, 

 which were driven by lifting a heavy stone and throw- 

 ing it with all the force possible upon the square end 

 of the teeth. A clevis was attached to the forward 



Uhid., 622. 

 ^IhicL, XVIII. 420. 

 Ubid., XXXII, 242, 243. 



