678 



Gardeti Mcmorajidums. 



tion of country labour; perhaps it is so still, but one is more reconciled to 

 it by seeing it partake in some degree of modern improvement, and become, 

 by the use of a machine, a species of manufacture. 



[By the use of railroads and steam carriages along the sides of all our main 

 roads, so many stones will not require to be broken. By means of loco- 

 motive stone-breaking machines, of which some are said to be already em- 

 ployed in Lancashire and Northumberland, this lowest degree of country 

 manual labour may be almost entirely superseded, or probably limited to 

 felons. We would never, at all events, send paupers on the roads ; because, 

 nless they are men of some strength, and paid by measure or the job, they 

 will never do any good. They are heart-broken already, and to send them 

 to break stones on a public road must be like a lingering deatii to them. We 

 hope the time will come when the labours of all paupers, not able-bodied, 

 will be confined to the workhouse gardens, and the gardens of parochial 

 institutions, (p. 696., and p. 714.)] 



The diameter of the stones to be broken according to the mode in ques- 

 tion should not exceed 5 or ^ jjg 

 6 in. They are placed on a "^ '^^ ^ 

 table of a triangular shape 

 {fig- 156.), boarded on three 

 sides like a dressing-table, 

 but open at the narrow end, 

 which is placed next and in 

 front of the operator, who 

 sits on a stool {b), or stands 

 as he may choose, and has a 

 block between him and the 

 point of the table (a), the 

 top of which is about 6 in. 

 lower than the top of the 

 table. By means of an iron 

 ring fixed into a handle of 

 wood (^g.l57.), he draws from the table as many of the stones as the 

 157 ring will enclose on the block, and then breaks them while still 

 enclosed in the ring, which is held by his left hand. When this 

 is done, then with another motion of the left hand, he draws 

 them in the ring off the block till they form a heap at one side, 

 or he at once drops them into the handbarrow measure. 

 {fig- 158.) To prevent any fragments from getting to his face, 

 he puts on a wire guard or veil ^ — — «=« 158 

 {fig- 159.), which may be tied by 

 a riband round his head, or sus- 

 pended from his hat. In the same 

 handbarrow, which serves as a cubic yard mea- 

 sure, stones are conveyed to any distance. The price 

 paid is so much a yard. In some places the breaking 

 apparatus consists of three separate parts, the table, 

 the block, and the stool j in others the whole is combined 

 in one machine, furnished with a wheel {fig. 1 56. c), which 

 serves as one foot when the machine is stationary, and 

 handles {d), by means of which it may be moved from 

 place to place as easily as a common wheelbarrow. It 

 only wants a light portable roof to protect the operator 

 from the rain or sun, and a moving side to shelter him 

 from the wind. These could be formed of sheet iron 

 or sheet zinc, at very little expense. 

 Observed some brick walls of sheds of open work, like the walls of 

 M'Phail's pits, to save materials and admit light and air; also some field 

 walls, built in the same manner, simply for the sake of saving materials. 



