FARM MACHINERY 



PART I 



INTRODUCTION 



i. One of the requirements for a steady, healthy growth 

 of any people or nation is a bountiful supply of food. 

 The earth can be made to produce in abundance only 

 when the soil is tilled and plants suitable for food are 

 cultivated. As long as the people of the earth roamed 

 about obtaining their subsistence by hunting and fishing, 

 conditions were not favorable for a rapid increase in 

 population or an advance in civilization. Tribes or 

 nations constantly encroached upon each other's rights 

 and were continually at war. History shows that when 

 any nation, isolated so as to be protected from the attacks 

 of other nations, devoted itself to agricultural pursuits, 

 its government at once became more stable and life and 

 property more secure. Protected in this way, a great 

 nation, shut off from the rest of the world by natural 

 means, and located in a fertile country, arose along the 

 banks of the Nile long before any other nation reached 

 prominence. The Gauls became mighty because they 

 devoted themselves to agriculture and obtained in this 

 way a more reliable supply of food. Pliny, the elder, in 

 his writings tells of the fields of Gaul and describes some 

 of the tools used. It has been estimated that there never 

 were more than 400,000 Indians in North America, and 

 they were often in want of food. Compare this number 

 with the present population. The tribes that flourished 



