14 MECHANICS. 



example, by a bad attachment to the plow for forcing 

 its wedge-like form most effectively through the soil. 

 "We may perhaps see but few instances of so great a 

 blunder as the man committed who fastened his 

 smaller horse to the shorter end of the whipple-tree, 

 to balance the large horse at the longer end ; or of the 

 other man, who, when riding on horseback to mill, 

 atop of his bag of grain, concluded to reheve the ani- 

 mal by dismounting, shouldering the bag himself, and 

 then remounting ; yet cases are not uncommon where 

 other operations are performed to almost as great a 

 disadvantage, and which, to a person well versed in 

 the science of mechanics, would appear nearly as 

 strange and absurd. 



The improvement of farm machines and tools with- 

 in the last fifty years has probably enabled the farmer 

 to effect twice as much work with the same force of 

 horses and men. Plows turn up the soil deeper, more 

 evenly and perfectly, and with greater ease of draught ; 

 hoes and spades have become lighter and more efficient ; 

 grain, instead of being beaten out by the slow and la- 

 borious work of the flail, is now showered in torrents 

 from the tlirashing-machinc ; horse-rakes accomplish 

 singly the work of many men using the old hand-rake ; 

 twelve to twenty acres of ripe grain are neatly cut in 

 one day with a two-horse reaper ; wheat drills, avoid- 

 ing the tiresome drudgery of sowing by hand, are ma- 

 terially increasing the amount of the wheat crop ; 

 while a few farmers are making a large yearly saving 

 by the application of horse-power to sawing wood, 

 churning, driving washing-machines, and even to ditch- 

 ing. A celebrated Enghsh farmer has lately accom- 



