256 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



In the best machines the bar is hung at right angles to the 

 frame, and the pitman and bar should always be in line. It 

 should have the most advanced devices for overcoming fric- 

 tion, and taking up wear, and convenience of handling. 

 Probably no machine is superior to all others in every 

 particular ; and the different points of superiority of a 

 mower or any machine can be determined only by carefully 

 conducted field trials, in which the relative amount of draft 

 is determined by actual test with an instrument. 



There were held, during the early days of the history of 

 the mowing machine and the improvement of the plow, 

 some famous field trials, — one at Geneva, N. Y., in 1852, 

 one at Syracuse, N. Y., in 1857, and one at Utica, N. Y., 

 in 1867. Nearly all the machines then made contested. A 

 copy of the report of the judges, who were many of them 

 men of eminent ability, is in the library of this Board, and 

 is well worth a careful study, especially the parts relating to 

 their method of awarding the prizes. I would suggest that 

 an improvement might be made by the use of a score card, 

 arranged to give the different points of excellence a relative 

 value. 



Every modern machine represents a number of inventions 

 which may be traced back to their origin. Here has been 

 truly an evolution. It is difficult to imagine what would 

 be our condition if we had only the machines in use at the 

 beginning of the century. It is safe to say that the pro- 

 duction and harvesting of six hundred million bushels of 

 wheat and eight hundred million bushels of corn would be 

 out of the question. The men whose efibrts contributed to 

 this progress should be regarded as benefactors and pro- 

 moters of the cause of liberty and the mastery of man over 

 the forces of nature. These men should be held in honor, 

 and their memory cherished by every friend of American 

 agriculture. Oftentimes the introduction of improved ma- 

 chines has been resisted for fear laljorers would be thrown 

 out of employment, and a large number of inventors have 

 failed to receive any adequate material reward. The Hon. 

 William H. Seward says, of Jethro Wood : "No citizen of 

 the United States has conferred greater benefits on his coun- 

 try ; no one of her benefactors has been more inadequately 



