1889.] PUBLIC DOCUMENT — No. 4. 213 



looks well, but oh, the labor ! Thousands and thousands of 

 bushels are injured or destroyed annually by the rains before 

 the threshing is over ; for at best, even with several thresh- 

 ing floors, it will take a number of weeks for all in the vil- 

 lage to have their turn. Eflbrts have 1)een made from time 

 to time to introduce more perfect machines, but the attempt 

 has always been viewed with distrust by the natives, and 

 dark hints have been mysteriously circulated of the agency 

 of the Evil One. We all remember the story of the opposi- 

 tion to the penny post in London, and how it was denounced 

 by the long-headed ones as an " insidious Popish contriv- 

 ance." History only repeats itself; and it was this same 

 conservative spirit that Sir Walter Scott satirizes in his 

 " Antiquary," when he puts into the mouth of Mause Head- 

 rigg the following objection to winnowing machines: "It 

 is a new-fangled machine for freeing the corn frae the chaff, 

 thus impiously thwarting the will o' divine Providence, by 

 raising wind for your leddyship's use by human art, instead 

 of soliciting it by prayer, or patiently waiting for whatever 

 dispensation of wind, Providence was pleased to send upon 

 the shieling hill." 



The other implements of husbandry are very simple and 

 primitive. The ox-yoke is made of two straight pieces, one 

 above, the other below the neck, the top piece alone being 

 hollowed. Two straight pins serve instead of the yoke to 

 inclose the neck, a strong tiiinnel in the middle taking the 

 l)lace of staple and ring. 



The plough is absurdly ridiculous. Take a pole about 

 ten feet long, four or five inches in diameter at the butt ; 

 and by mortise and tenon unite this at a slightly acute angle 

 to another piece of about equal size, sharpened and shod 

 with iron to plough the earth, and variously provided with 

 some sort of a handle for the ploughman's hand, and you 

 have an Oriental plough. It does not turn a furrow, it 

 simply scratches the earth to the depth of four or five inches, 

 and then the ground must be cross-ploughed in order to 

 secure anything like an adequate preparation for the sowing. 

 European ploughs, to which several pairs of buffaloes were 

 attached, have been introduced at various times, but were 

 soon given up on account of the difficulty of finding animals 



