1856. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



401 



MACHINE FOa STRIPPING BEOOM CORN. 



Among the numberless machines for saving la- 

 bor, there are few more effectual or more impor- 

 tant than this. The old mode, and it is the mode 

 now generally practised, is a slow, tedious, expen- 

 sive one ; expensive, because it requires so much 

 time of able-bodied persons who might be more 

 profitably employed. The way in which it was 

 done, was by placing two pieces of steel or iron on 

 a large block, or some firm place, resembling, some- 

 what, the letter V, but having a spring to them so 

 as to yield or advance a little according to the size 

 of the handful of brush placed between them. The 

 brush was then drawn slowly through, scraping off 

 the seed, which fell upon the floor or in measures, 

 mixed with more or less of the ends of the husk 

 broken off in the process of scraping. 



With the machine figured above the process is 

 far different. It is supplied by belts moving 

 over the platform on which the brush is placed 

 crosswise, in handfuls, in such a position as to have 

 the tooth wheel seize the brush just where the 

 hurll and quill join, and carry it to the cylinders, 

 which commence their work at the tip of the brush, 

 straitening it out, and stripping off the seed. The 

 circular cutters cut the quills to a projier length if 

 too long, and the brush leaves the machine stripped 

 of seed, and in a perfect condition. 



The machine is safe to use, as those tending it are 

 not liable to those terrible accidents to which they 



were exposed in machines where the brush was 

 held in the hands ; it will also earn its cost in the 

 saving of brush grown on 200 acres ! 



It is manufactured in a thorough and desirable 

 manner, by Messrs. Burt, Wright & Co., at Har- 

 vard, Mass. See advertisement in another column. 



WASHING CLOTHES. 



Messrs. Editors : — I noticed in the Country 

 Geiillemaji of June 5th, an inquiry about washing 

 clothes and washing machines. I have never used 

 any machine but the primitive one, which, I sup- 

 pose, has been in use ever since clothes were 

 washed ; so I cannot speak from experience about 

 other machines. But I have used for several years 

 a washing fluid, which very much lessens the labor 

 of washing, without hijuving the clothes in the least. 

 It is made as follows: take, for one gallon of water 

 one pound of washing soda, and a quarter of a 

 pound of unslaked lime. Put them in the water, 

 and simmer twenty minutes. '\\'hen cool, pour off 

 tlie clear fluid into glass or stone ware, (for it will 

 ruin earthenware, causing it to crack until it falls 

 to pieces.) If the clothes are very dirty, put them 

 in soak over night ; wring them them out in the 

 morning ; soaj) them, and put them in the wash- 

 kettle, Avith enough water to cover them. To a 

 common-sized kettle or Ijoiler full, put a tea-cup- 

 full of fluid. Boil half an hour, then wash well 

 through one suds, and rinse thoroughly in two wa- 

 ters. Those careful housewives, who have always 

 washed their clothes twice, then boiled them, and 

 then washed them again, will think this a very su- 



