112 RENNIE'S MASTER ANDREW MEIKLE. PART VII. 



of so revolving beat off the corn instead of rubbing 

 it off by pressure, as had been attempted by former 

 contrivers. By dint of study and perseverance, he suc- 

 ceeded at length in perfecting his machine ; to which 

 he added solid fluted feeding rollers, and afterwards a 

 machine for shaking the straw, fanners for winnowing 

 the corn, and other improvements. Meikle is said to 

 have been superintending a mill job at Leith at the time 

 he was engaged in working out the contrivance in his 

 mind. He was accustomed to walk there and back within 

 the same day while the job was in hand, or a distance of 

 about forty miles. He studied the subject during his 

 journey, and would occasionally stop while travelling to 

 draw a rapid diagram upon the road with his walking- 

 stick. It is related of him that on one occasion, whilst 

 very much engrossed with the subject of his thrashing- 

 mill, he had, absorbed by his calculations, wandered 

 considerably from the right path. He stopped short 

 suddenly, and hastily sketching his plan on the road, 

 exclaimed, " I have got it ! I have got it ! " Archi- 

 medes himself, when he cried " Eureka," could not have 

 been more delighted than our millwright was at the 

 happy upshot of his deliberations. 



The first machine erected on Meikle' s new principle 

 was put up in 1787 for Mr. Stein of Kilbeggie, in 

 Clackmannanshire, who had great difficulty in procuring 

 a sufficient number of barnsmen for thrashing straw to 

 litter the large stock of cattle he had on hand ; but the 

 novelty of the experiment, and the doubt entertained 

 by Mr. Stein as to the efficacy of the proposed machine, 

 induced him to require, as a condition, that if it did not 

 answer the intended purpose, Meikle was not to receive 

 any payment for it. The result, however, proved quite 

 satisfactory, and the thrashing-machine at Kilbeggie, 

 which was driven by water-power, long continued in 

 good working order. The next he erected was for Mr. 

 George Eennie, at Phantassie, in the same year ; and by 



