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PART III. 



MISCELLANEOUS INTELLIGENCE. 



Art. I. General Notices. 



Machine for cutting Grass on Lawns and Grass-plols. — On looking over 

 the National Repository, London, with a view to such inventions as 

 might be applicable to gardening or agriculture, we were much gratified to 

 see a machine apparently well adapted for mowing lawns. It is not so much 

 an original invention, as a new adaptation of one of the most efficient me- 

 chanical contrivances employed for shearing cloth. In general bulk ami 

 appearance, the machine may be said to resemble a small cast-iron roller ; 

 when examined, and pushed forward, there is " an obvious fitness for its 

 oliject, a facilit}' of a{)plication, a readiness and nicety of adjustment, and 

 a workmanlike accuracy of execution, that must satisfy every mechanist." 

 The machine has been at work, for nearly four months, in the Zoological 

 Society's gardens in the Regent's Park ; and the foreman of the gardens 

 there, Mr. Curtis, informed us (Sept. 23.) that he is entirely satisfied with 

 it. With two men, one to draw and another to push, it does as much 

 work as six or eight men with scythes and brooms; not only in mowing, 

 but sweeping up the grass, and lifting it into a box ; performing the whole 

 so perfectly, as not to leave a mark of any kind behind. There is not the 

 slightest difficidty in using the machine : all that is requisite is to have the 

 lawn free from stones or other roughnesses, and the grass perfectly dry. 

 The cutters, we were informed, may require sharpening once in two 

 months ; and this is done by oiling them, and ilrawing the machine back- 

 wards, as they then act like scissors, one blade upon another. What is par- 

 ticularly gratifying in the use of this machine is, that the grass is required 

 to be perfectly dry ; so that, where it is used (and we are much mistaken 

 if it does not soon come into use in ail large grounds), men can neither be 

 set to work at it very early in the morning nor late in the evening. Evelyn 

 tells us, that, when he visited Paris in the end of the seventeenth century, all 

 the sh.ort grass was cut in the night-time. This is still the case, though there 

 is not now so nuich to cut ; and in many places in Britain, short grass is 

 of necessity cut ver} early in the morning, before the dew is evaporated. 

 Even if a corresponding period of rest be allowed to men thus set to 

 work at unseasonable hours, we still think such a mode of labouring has 

 a tendency to oppression ; and we rejoice to see the means by which gar- 

 deners may in future be emancipated from it. The nearer that all labours 

 are brought to a level, in point of severity as well as skill, the better, for 

 various reasons ; and the progress of improvement has decidedly this tend- 

 ency. We rejoice in this machine for another reason, which is, that it 

 will greatly facilitate the keeping, and, in consequence, multiply the num- 

 ber, of grass lawns in warm countries; such, for example, as the continents 

 of Europe and America. 



The machine is manufactured b}' J. Ferrabee, Phoenix Foundcry, near 

 Stroud, Gloucestershire ; the price is from seven to ten guineas ; and 

 orders aj'e received in London by Messrs. Lewis and Davis, 10. Basingliall 

 Street. \Ye sincerely hope that every gardener whose employ er can afford 

 it will procure a machine, and give it a trial, even durini; the present sca- 



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