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NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Mat 





sumed a conspicuous position in agriculture, and 

 many have been inclined to regard more the con- 

 stituent elements of plants and of artificial ma- 

 nures than the mechanical condition of the soil ; 

 like quack doctors, whose attention is so much 

 occupied by their specifics that they entirely over- 

 look the condition of their patients. 



But now, after the practical failure of the the- 

 ories of some distinguished chemists, agricultur- 

 ists are again disposed to regard the physical 

 condition of the soil as of primary importance, 

 and the operations of draining and subsoiling, and 

 otherwise opening a greater depth of soil to the 

 action of the atmosphere and to the roots of the 

 plant, engage the attention of the farmer. As 

 land becomes more valuable it is found more con- 

 venient to add another seed bed to the field by 

 preparing it nnder the shallow furrow turned by 

 our fathers, rather than by annexing our neigh- 

 bor's farm, in the covetous desire to possess all 

 the land that adjoins our own. And so we are 

 looking for more power to work our land deeper 

 and to pulverize it more thoroughly. In England 

 four or five plowings are considered essential to 

 preparation for a good crop of turnips. In Amer- 

 ica, where labor is more costly and products 

 usually cheaper, we the more need some new aids 

 to our husbandry. Livy says that Romulus, in 

 his distribution of the land, allotted two acres to 

 each citizen, and that after the expulsion of the 

 kings it was increased to seven. Columella tells 

 us that the patrimonial estate on which Cincin- 

 natus employed himself consisted of four acres I 

 Yet we, whose single farms are larger than the 

 city of Rome, with her seven hills, arc plodding 

 along, bound to the old notion that the plow used 

 by the Romans, or at least its principles of opera- 

 tion, must be forever preserved. Every one knows 

 how much better is the preparation of the garden 

 by forking up and raking, than by turning with 

 the plow and harrowing ; and the implement de- 

 sired now, in place of the plow, is a forking or 

 digging machine that shall at one operation stir 

 the ground to sufficient depth, leaving it as nearly 

 as possible in the condition of a garden bed, pre- 

 pared with a fork. Such a machine has been at- 

 tempted in France. 



THE FRENCH STEAM PLOW OR CULTIVATOR. 



In a walk near Paris last July, I accidentally 

 came upon a steam cultivator or digging machine 

 in full operation. It was a locomotive engine, 

 with, I think, twelve spades or forks, working 

 in pairs, on bent axles, from which the spades, if 

 they may be so called, projected at right angles. 

 My impression is that each pair of spades struck 

 the ground and entered it separately, each of the 

 six pairs successively doing its work, as the lo- 

 comotive traversed the ground, and thus forking 



up the soil to the depth of six or twelve inches, 

 at the will of the operator, and four and a half 

 feet wide. The machine was under examination 

 by some commission, at the time, and I Avas in- 

 formed that no report had yet been made upon 

 it, and no patent secured, and that no description 

 or drawing of it could be obtained. I took a 

 great deal of pains afcerwards to obtain further 

 information ; and from my inability to do so, in- 

 ferred that there were reasons Avhy the inventor 

 desired at present, that his machine should not 

 be made public. I was told upon the ground, 

 that the engine was only of three horse power, 

 but its performance indicated far more. It moved 

 upon broad wheels, however, over the soft ground 

 which had been before stirred by it, and turned 

 without difficulty, at the end of the furrow. The 

 spades, I think, were upon three or more inde- 

 pendent axles, and worked between the wheels 

 of the engine. Doubtless the invention will soon 

 be made public, and the full description of it 

 given to the world. With my very limited 

 knowledge of machinery, and my inability to con- 

 verse on a technical subject in the French lan- 

 guage, I could not understand its details, and 

 find it impossible to convey more than a general 

 impression of the working of this machine. — 

 Steam digging machines constructed with spades 

 or teeth set in a cylinder have been before at- 

 tempted. The great obstacle to their success has 

 been found in the fact, that the moist earth clogs 

 the teeth, and fills the spaces between them. In 

 the French machine, this objection appeared to 

 be obviated by the arrangement of the teeth or 

 spades, which were curved like the nails of a 

 mole, upon several small axles. 



No steam plow that has come under my notice 

 appears so likely to prove of practical utility as 

 this French machine. Two points seem to be 

 established, that the steam cultivator must be a 

 locomotive, and that its operation must be not 

 that of plowing, but of spading or digging, or 

 possibly of stirring merely, by drawing through 

 the soil a set of teeth, in the manner of the sub- 

 soil plow, or of the English scarifier. 



That such an implement will, upon the broad 

 fields of the West, if not elsewhere, soon be seen 

 in common use cannot be doubted. To see clearly, 

 as all must see, the necessity for such an improve- 

 ment, and at the same time, to have before us so 

 many practical suggestions for its introduction, 

 and to doubt of its ultimate success, were to set 

 narrow bounds to human ingenuity, and to dis- 

 card our belief in human progress. 



Cranberries. — Persons wishing to engage 

 extensively in the culture of cranberries, may find 

 it to their advantage to correspond with WlNS- 

 LOW Roberts, Esq., at Brooks, Maine. 



