10 THE HORSE 



the great wheat districts of the northwest, where the 

 fields are often a mile long and where two plows are 

 mounted on wheels and drawn by five horses (Fig. 1), 

 and where ten rounds, or twenty miles, that is, forty 

 miles of a single furrow, sixteen inches wide, is plowed 

 in a day, a single workman accomplishes, in the pul- 

 verization and preparation of the six and a half acres, 

 more than a hundred hand laborers could do in a 

 day of the severest toil. Or a still more striking illus- 

 tration of the economy of horse over man power may 

 be given. In many of the great wheat -fields of Cali- 

 fornia, from twenty-two to thirty-two horses are 

 attached to a combined machine (Fig. 2) which cuts, 

 threshes, cleans and sacks from one thousand to two 

 thousand bushels of wheat per day. One man drives 

 the horses and two or three others tend the machine 

 and sew up the sacks of grain, the four spending less 

 muscular energy than was formerly required merely to 

 cut by hand a single acre. 



Nearly as great economy of human muscle is seen 

 in the large cities, by the substitution of horses for 

 men in the transportation of heavy merchandise, for 

 short distances. By reason of crowded streets and cost 

 of maintenance, only one or two animals are usually 

 harnessed'to a vehicle. Although only a few horses are 

 brought together in this case to assist a single man, 

 the American has seen to it that large, stout horses 

 are provided, two of which are able to move a load 

 of from four to ten tons over paved streets, a load 

 equal to that carried by a freight car in the early days 

 of steam railways. 



