218 CHRONICLES OF A CLAY FARM. 



know how it is, but it seems to haunt me like. 

 You've done me harm, ["Hal"?] you have indeed! 

 I used to love follering the plow, and see it heave 

 up the furrow-slice so smooth and nice, and swelling 

 the rich earth as it swam along, "better than any 

 thing I know on earth except, perhaps, hearing 

 my little Fanny reading when I come home sleepy 

 at nights, but now I don't know how it is, I 

 seem to run my head again' it every time I see it, 

 on stiff' ground, a-squeeging and pressing, and 

 kneading its way along : it gives me the very head- 

 ache to look at it ; it does, really ! Now, please not 

 to mind the long words, for once ; but let me hear it 

 on to the end. I should like to know the worst on 

 it and the best, if there is any. I want to know, 

 now, really, why, if Steam's the proper thing why 

 it has n't been done. They do most things by steam 

 now-a-days : if it is to get upon the fields, why don't 

 it? What stops it?" 



"You have asked," said I, "the very question I 

 ask too "Why is it that among all the great inven- 

 tions of the day, the subject of CULTIVATION BY STEAM 

 seems to hang fire. Not for want of thought upon 

 the topic ; for there are many minds full of thought 

 about it, and few people now-a-days believe the 

 thing impracticable : indeed, no one can find any 



