208 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER 



DEC. IS, 1839. 



For the New England Wrmer. 



LABOR AND LABOR-SAVING MACHINES. 



We conceive that many American writers, in 

 urging the adoption of foreign agricultural improve- 

 ments, overlook one very important ingredient in 

 European farming, essential to a high standard of 

 husbandry, and that is the extreme ioiv rate of wa- 

 ges abroad compared with what it is in this coun- 

 try. In the old and fully-peopled countries of Eu- 

 rope, is a large surplus population, incapable ofbe- 

 ing landholders, or entering into commerce and the 

 trades, from the arbitrary rules that govern them, 

 and who must content themselves with the smallest 

 daily pittance or starve. Such a population is 

 more at the disposal of the farming than any other 

 interest in society, and is one of the main pillars 

 of the high and improving state of English, Scotch, 

 and French agriculture. With us the farmer has 

 no such resource. Ours is a new country, and, 

 from the freedom and elasticity of action engender- 

 ed by our institutions, and the inducements held 

 out to e.vertion, all are striving to outstrip each 

 other in the acquisition of wealth and reputation. 

 Land is cheap and abundant, and there is ample 

 room for action ; and every man who has a common 

 degree of intelligence and industry, may become a 

 landholder. Men follow their natural inclinations, 

 and prefer being independent citizens and their 

 own masters, to being in the employment of other in 

 dividuals. Under this state of things, those pursuits 

 that are carried on with much manual labor, are 

 attended with the most expense to those engaged 

 in them, and meet with no small obstacle to their 

 success in the fact, that they create a demand, for 

 which the supply is by no means adequate. Amer- 

 ican farming is one of these pursuits ; its various 

 operations being almost entirely performed by bodi- 

 ly labor, unassisted in a great degree, by nature 

 or art. To every pursuit and profession among us 

 have the sciences and arts lent more assistance 

 than to our husbandry ; and we believe that this 

 is one very great reason why all other pursaits are 

 so much in advance of it. The innumerable results 

 of human invention, the application of the laws that 

 govern the operations of nature, to the daily avoca- 

 tions of man, have carried us forward with an in- 

 credible rapidity as a commercial and manufactu- 

 ring people. They have been capital and labor to 

 us, amply supplying the deficiencies of both. 



Amid this hurrying forward to perfection of al- 

 most every calling amongst us, we would not say 

 that our agrxulture remains where it stood fifty 

 years ago, for we believe it has advanced within 

 that period — but we find it creeping on at a com- 

 paratively snail'.-; pace unassisted, in a great 

 measure, by art or science, and harrassed by the 

 same impediments, that hampered it in the days of 

 our fatiiers. We speak, nf course, of the general 

 state of American farming, as manifested through- 

 out tlie country, and would not include those ex- 

 ceptions in districts and individuals, that, from their 

 rarity, do us the more honor. 



With nothing have our farmers had to contend 

 more than this scarcity of labor we have referred to. 

 The high rate of wages has eaten up the profits of 

 the farm, and debarred them from making many im- 

 provements in their husbandry; and this the more 

 so, inasmuch as the raising of crops fi>r the market, 

 requiring much and constant manual labor, has 

 been the prevailing agricultural interest. This ob- 

 stacle to their more rapid improvement and success 

 has been so prominent and palpable, that we have 



often wondered at the neglect and indifference man- 

 ifested by many of our farmers towards those im- 

 plements and machines that have been ofl^ered them 

 from time to time, for abridging and facilitating the 

 labors of the ftrm. 



Husbandmen should remember that just in pro- 

 portion as they save in the time of performing their 

 daily operations, just in the same proportion do 

 they economise in the item of labor, and in the ex- 

 pense incurred by it. .\s for instance, if my two 

 hired men, at the expense of a dollar a day apiece, 

 can thresh with the flail, one hundred bushels of 

 grain in ten days, the threshing of my grain will 

 have cost me twenty dollars, taking no account of 

 the inevitable loss by waste. Now if by the use of 

 a threshing machine, at an expense say, of two dol- 

 lars per day, with the assistance of a man and a 

 boy at one dollar and a half per day, my one hun- 

 dred bushels of grain can be threshed in two days, 

 it will be done at an expense of seven dollars in- 

 stead of twenty, with a gain also, of eight days 

 time. We presume the items in this estimate are 

 incorrect, but we believe the difference in time and 

 expense will not he found to be much exaggerated, 

 and will serve to illustrate our proposition, that 

 whatever is saved in the time of performing the daily 

 operations of the farm, is so nuieh gained in the tva- 

 ges of labor. 



We advance another proposition, that, not only 

 cio we, by the use of labor-saving machines, econo- 

 mise in time and the expense attending labor, but 

 also that just in proportion as we economise in those 

 two items, just in the same proportion does the smne 

 amount of capital go further in the cultivation and 

 improvement of the farm. If I have twenty dollars 

 to pay for threshing one hundred bushels of grain 

 by the flail in ten days, and can, by the use of a 

 threshing machine, have the same amount thresh- 

 ed in two days for seven dollars, I have actually 

 gained eight days and thirteen dollars, which I 

 may spend in other duties upon the farm, or, which 

 is the same thing, 1 can with the same amount of 

 capital, perform neai-ly three times as much labor 

 in three quarters of the time. 



We would suggest then, on the strength of these 

 two propositions, that, by the aid of labor-saving 

 implements, our farmers may perform the usual la- 

 bors of the farm at a much reduced expense, and, 

 with the same outlay of capital, may also accom- 

 plish a very much increased amount of labor, and 

 consequently an increased production. We know 

 that it will be objected, thafthis appears very well 

 upon paper, and may accord very well with a closet 

 calculation, Imtthat we have omitted to take notice 

 of the item of the frst expense of all machines, 

 more particularly those of modern inventicm, and 

 of the constant wear-and-tear attending their opera- 

 tion. We have made a liberal allowance for all 

 this in the two general propositions we have ad- 

 vanced — the more liberal, inasmuch as wherever 

 labor-saving machinery upon farms has come under 

 our notice, the expense of purchase and repairs has 

 been more than amply made good by the expense 

 saved in the wages of hired men, by the superior 

 and expeditious manner in which the various opera- 

 tions of the farm have been performed, and by the 

 greater amount accomplished. 



Our limits will allow us to record but one in- 

 stance of ihe successful employment of labor-saving 

 machinery upon farms, and there is no feature in 

 the farming in the instance referred to, that we 

 more admire than the manner in which art and sci- 

 ence are made to supply the place of several pair 



of hands. We will only say that the gentlemai 

 referred to is one of the most intelligent and dis 

 tinguished farmers in the State of New York, whosi 

 practice as well as his experience and opinions, ma; 

 be most confidently relied upon. Our friend, ii 

 the first place, has upon his farm a portable hors 

 poicer, e machine in too common use to need a de 

 scriptioH; and which, by the medium of the whee 

 and band, is capable of giving motion to machine 

 for various purposes. In connection with this pow 

 er, he employs a grain thresher, (of whose invenlio: 

 we do not recollect,) by which his grain is threshe 

 in a third or quarter of the usual time, with scarce 

 ly any of the waste attendant upon the use of th 

 flail, and which, when he is not using it himself, i 

 passing from farmer to farmer to expedite their op 

 erations. By the aid of the same horse power ap 

 plied to a simple circular saw by means of a ban 

 and wheel, he is enabled to effect the cutting of hi 

 winter's fuel, in a very few days (we had alraoE 

 said hours,) without any of that waste of chipi 

 that, in a series of years makes no small item in 

 farmer's economy. The same band and whet 

 transferred to his grindstone, and a pair of hand 

 are saved at the crank, while by the increased pon 

 er and velocity, two can be employed at the ston 

 with greater ease and expedition than once coul 

 be by the aid of the common handle. The powe 

 obtained by the wheel and band, again transferre 

 to his hay and straw cutter, and a couple of houi 

 work prepares cut feed for a stock of twenty hea 

 for several days, and thus brings into successft 

 operation a machine, that has not been in generE 

 use for a large stock of cattle from the great lengt 

 of time required to cut the food by manual labo 

 By the use of the horse-rake, he contrives to sav 

 the labor of several hours and men in raking hi 

 level lands, and by a simple machine, we believ 

 of his own construction, he plasters an extent c 

 land in a few moments, that would require an hoi 

 or two to pass over, if the plaster should be sow 

 by hand. Indeed he forces machinery to perforr 

 for him every operation on the farm, whereby he ca 

 save time and wages paid to hired men, — a systei 

 which ho finds more expensive than the old fashior 

 ed method of entire hand labor at the onset, but it 

 finitely, infinitely more economical in the end. 



And now when we ask ourselves how many c 

 our farmers will he convinced of the truth of whs 

 we have said sufficiently to practice upon it, w 

 find but a discouraging answer in our observalio 

 upon the prevalent systems of husbandry about uf 

 When we urge the adoption of improved agriculti 

 ral implements and labor-saving machines, we ar 

 met with excuses of a want of c; pital to meet th 

 first expense, — of an inability to use successfull 

 many implements and machines, from their compl 

 Gated character — and of a want of confidence i 

 all improvements in agricultural implements, froi 

 the repeati'd instances of quackery under whic 

 they have suflered, in the numerous machines the 

 have been palmed upon them as useful inventioni 

 and which turned out to be mere clap-trap. In re 

 ply to all this we can only say, begin on a sma 

 scale, but do not be afraid to venture. Whether i 

 be a horse-rake, or an improved plough, or whs 

 not, incur the frst expense, and its use will repa 

 you four-fold. Be not alarmed because the dolls 

 you invest to-day will not return to you to-morrov 

 but be contented to wait, if there is any reasonabl 

 hope that it may come back to you at a more dis 

 tant day trebled or quadrupled. And remeinbe 

 when you purchase, that the object of all improve 



