THE PLAIN "ENGLISH" OF rr. 209 



equable mechanical motion, the revolver behind, 

 with its cutting-points (case-hardened) playing upon 

 the edge, or land-side of the trench as it advances, 

 and capable of any adjustment to coarse or fine 

 cutting ; moving always forward, and leaving be- 

 hind, granulated and inverted by its revolving 

 action, a seed-bed seven or eight inches deep, 

 never to be gone over again by any after-implement 

 except the drill, which had much better follow at 

 once, attached behind with a light brush-harrow to 

 cover the seed. 



"It is hard, by mere language and without a dia- 

 gram, to describe intelligibly to the mind's eye an 

 instrument that has not been seen, however it may 

 have 'become familiar to my own. My notion may 

 be wrong, but I am strongly induced to feel that 

 such an instrument alone will ever fulfill the requi- 

 sitions of the steam-engine, which shortens and 

 remodels every labor it undertakes, and never con- 

 descends to old appliances, except where they are 

 themselves intrinsically perfect in their mode of 

 action. 



"Why did Steam reject the Pump-handle and 

 the Oar! Because, in both, the leverage is ob- 

 tained by loss of labor and time, occurring during 

 the back movement of the handle, a movement 



