HIS LIFE AND WORK 



The young inventor toiled "laboriously," he 

 says, to complete his Reaper in time for the har- 

 vest of 1831. He was very nearly too late, but 

 a small patch of wheat was left standing at his 

 request; and one day in July, with no specta- 

 tors except his parents and his excited brothers 

 and sisters, Cyrus put a horse between the 

 shafts of his Reaper, and drove against the yel- 

 low grain. The reel revolved and swept the 

 gentle wheat downwards upon the knife. Click ! 

 Click! Click! The white steel blade shot back 

 and forth. The grain was cut. It fell upon the 

 platform in a shimmering golden swath. From 

 here it was raked off by a young laborer named 

 John Cash. It was a roughly done specimen of 

 reaping, no doubt. The reel and the divider 

 worked poorly. But for a preliminary test it 

 was a magnificent success. Here, at last, was 

 a Reaper that reaped, the first that had ever 

 been made in any country. 



The scene of this first "reaping by horse- 

 power" was then, and is to-day, one of unusual 

 beauty. The field is near by the farm-house, 

 rolling in several undulations to the rim of a 



[35] 



