216 



The Insulated Coulter. 



Vol. VIII. 



fibres ; pins and needles were made of the 

 thorns at the extremity of its leaves ; and 

 the root, when properly cooked, v/as con- 

 verted into a palatable and nutritious food 

 The agave, in short, was meat, drink, cloth- 

 ing, and writina" materials, for the Aztec! 

 Surely, never did nature enclose in so com 

 pact a form, so many of the elements of hu 

 man comfort and civilization !" 



For the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 The Insulated Coulter. 



Mr. Editor, — The testimony of your 

 correspondent, Joseph Henderson, in fa 

 vour of the Centre-draught plough, is but 

 the experience of thousands of our most 

 eminent agriculturists. That it " performs 

 its work admirably, and requires less motive 

 power than any other," has often been proved 

 by actual experiment ; and in no instance 

 ■where the trial has been properly conducted, 

 have there been tvv'o opinions on the subject 

 But the defect mentioned by JAlr. IL, is novel, 

 and- for the first time do I notice it coming 

 from one who is practically engaged in a 

 business, which admits so ready a mode of 

 adjuslment. I have long been conversant 

 with the use .of the lock-coulter, as it is 

 called, and would draw the attention of your 

 intelligent correspondent to the fact, that in 

 whole sections of country, whether lime- 

 stone or otherwise, be it never so rugged or 

 ever so stony, and where the utmost atten- 

 tion is paid to cultivation generally, espe- 

 cially to tliat most important of all opera- 

 tions, ploughing, the lock-coulter has never 

 been used, and therefore, its necessity lias 

 never been known or felt. Not only so, the 

 insulated-coulter has here been found to 

 "sustain the most violent shocks encoun 

 tered against the rocks concealed below the 

 surface,*' without leading their owners to 

 conceive of the "absolute necessity that the 

 coulter and point should be united, so as 

 mutually to protect and support each other." 

 Nay, more, in these very rough and stony 

 soils it is, that the lock-coulter would be 

 considered the most improper arrangement 

 that could be devised ; preventing the share 

 from working and making its way in a soil 

 the most unfit to be operated upon by cutting 

 — the breaking process being the only mode 

 applicable in such cases. It has long been 

 known, that the strength of one horse in the 

 team is expended on the lock-coulter; it is 

 therefore no wonder that the Shielman 

 plough is found of " heavy draught." 



In districts where the lock-coulter is 

 commonly used, it is not strange that the 

 idea of its necessity should be entertained; 

 for there I have always observed, that when- 



ever the insulated-coulter is used, it is very 

 apt to be set too low ; the space of three or 

 four inches from the point, appearing, to one 

 iccustomed to see the coulter resting upon 

 it, a monstrous height ; and this, I believe, 

 accounts for move than one half the diffi- 

 culty that your correspondent has experi- 

 enced ; the coulter then cuts too much — in- 

 deed, in stony soils, the province of the 

 coulter is merely to separate the sward, 

 leaving the point and share, and the breast 

 of the plough to break up the remainder of 

 the furrow, which this plough is calculated 

 to do in a way peculiarly her own, on the 

 Centre-draught principle, which enables her 

 to work as it were, with the power of two 

 hands instead of one. But Centre-draught 

 ploughs are made with lock-coultcrs, and 

 may be obtained at No. 176 Market street, 

 Philadelphia; on their first introduction, 

 many of them were so construcl:ed, but at 

 present about five hundred for one, are 

 sold with tlie insulated-coulter, and that too, 

 for every kind of soil, from the primitive 

 Granite and the limestone, to the clay, and 

 tiie sands of Jersey and the Eastern Shore 

 of Maryland; and in all, it is found superior 

 to all others. If your correspondent's land 

 is peculiarly rocky and rugged, let him get 

 a coulter one quarter of an inch thicker; 

 and in sharpening, let it not be drawn too 

 thin on the edge, or too ponited ; let it be 

 well steeled and set in an exact line v^'ith 

 the land side of the plough, extending 

 Within three or four inches of the point, de- 

 pending upon the depth to which the plough 

 is put, and the thickness of the surface- 

 sward ; and debit the team with the cost. 

 In all the late trials of ploughs, was it ever 

 known that a lock-coulter plough carried 

 off the first premium 1 



Is Mr. H.'s plough No. 5|, self-sharpen- 

 ing, and with a wheel 1 If it is, I ask, what 

 would be the result, if, on setting the coulter 

 strniglit with the land side of the plough, 

 and from three to four inches high from the 

 point of the share, he were to put her to 

 work in the hands of a careful and compe- 

 tent ploughman, on his roughest soil ? — no- 

 thing would give me greater pleasure than 

 to be present on such an occasion. A lock- 

 coulter plough, is, essentially, a ciitting 

 plough — the most improper for use on stony 

 soils — the Centre-draught plough, with an 

 insulated coulter, is strictly a hreakivg-vp 

 plough ; the only one that can be used on 

 such soils, \v\i\\ any degree of propriety. 



I would take this occasion to inform your 

 correspondent F. W., — see page 81, Cabinet 

 for October last,— that the "'^fatal defect." 

 arising from the fact of the Centre-draught 

 plough being altogether a right-handed 



