and on Miscellaneous Inventions at the Birmingham Show. 267 
Table of merits, — the highest attainment being 957 points out 
of 1000 constituting perfection. 
The Judges awarded the first prize to Messrs. R. Hornsby 
and Sons' Six-armed Machine, with controllable delivery and 
small main wheel (No. 4(i4) ; the second prize to Messrs. 
Hornsby and Sons' Five-armed Machine, with small main 
wheel, but not controllable delivery (No. 463) ; and the third 
prize to Messrs. Hornsby and Sons' Six-armed Machine, with 
controllable delivery and large main wheel (No. 466). They 
highly commended Messrs. Hornsby and Sons' Six-armed 
Machine, with controllable delivery (No. 469) ; and also 
Messrs. Hornsby and Sons' Five-armed Machine, with control- 
lable delivery and large main wheel (No. 467) ; and they 
•commended the Johnston Company's Wrought-iron Self-deli- 
very Reaper (No. 378). 
Class 2. Reaping Machines with Self -delivery in Swathe clear 
of the Horse Track. — There were four entries in this class ; 
three horse-power Machines, and Messrs. Aveling and Porter's 
Reaper attached to a locomotive steam-engine ; and the pre- 
' liminary trial in Field No. 1, of generally upstanding ripe 
red wheat, was made on Monday and Tuesday, August 14th 
and 15th. 
Messrs. JR. Hornsby and Sons' Six-armed Sheaf-delivery Machine, without 
controllable rakes (471 Catalogue number), was set with every rake delivering, 
thus operating as a swather. In the run there occurred one stoppage, from a 
•stone being caught against the crank connecting-rod. The cutting was well 
■done, and the swathe of strong but short straw was tolerably laid. 
The next tried was Messrs. Hornsby's Swather, a left-hand machine, worked 
fcy a pair of horses walking alongside the standing crop, as in the ordinary 
sheafing-machines, but with the cutter-bar in a line more backward than the 
main driving-wheel, the swathe being delivered in the rear of that wheel from 
a slanting platform, and the corn bent down over the knife and platform by a 
rotating reel. To the pole is fixed one iron shaft, on the side next the crop, 
and a whipple-tree on the other side ; so, that the machine works with the 
steady guidance due to the yoking of one of the horses in this pair of shafts. 
The seat for the driver is placed in a dangerous position, directly in front of 
the main wheel and gear. The total breadth of the machine over all is 8 
feet 4 inches for a cut of 5 feet, and the driving-wheel is of 2 feet 6 inches 
diameter, with 9-inch broad plain tire ; to which, however, biting-irons can be 
attached at pleasure. The main wheel is mounted upon a cranked-axle frame 
or bracket, which is adjustable by screw-rack motion to different heights ; and 
the intermediate-motion axis, driven by pinions and an annular toothed-wheel 
inside the main wheel, passes through the socket-bearing or centre by which 
the crank-axle bracket is connected to the main frame of the machine, and so 
drives the crank-shaft, which is outside the frame. The connecting-rod passes 
behind the main driving-wheel. The off-wheel, of 12 inches diameter, with 
<3-inch wide tire, is mounted in the fork of a lever placed under the far-side of 
the sloping platform, and is set higher or lower instantly by means of this 
lever. For ease in following different directions the wheel is hung upon an 
axis considerably longer than the breadth of the wheel, and two spiral springs 
inclosing the axis, one on each side the wheel, hold it in the mid-way position. 
