216 CHRONICLES OF A CLAY FARM. 



minds a mode of tillage so long compelled by the 

 very nature and necessity of animal power : every 

 child that has wept and smiled over the " Death of 

 Cock-robin " knows when he hears 



Who'll toll the bell ? 

 " I," says the Bull, 

 " Because I can pull" 



that Mr. Bull was guilty of a pun ; that the ' pull ' 

 of a quadruped is only horizontal ; that his strength 

 can be applied in no other way ; and that when you 

 employ a four-footed beast to cultivate the soil, you 

 have no choice left but horizontal traction, from one 

 end of the field to the other ; a mode of action which 

 commenced when the spade was abandoned in field- 

 culture for the plough, and which was to continue 

 so long as horse-power tillage continued; and no 

 longer: since it formed (as the spade had already 

 shown) no necessary element of cultivation, and had 

 no relevance whatever with the action or capabilities 

 of the Steam-engine. 



' Steam-power having, however, been hitherto 

 chiefly employed in Manufactures, and its versatile 

 modes of application being unfamiliar to the agricul- 

 turist, we can scarcely be surprised, that even those 



