736 Report on Implements at Preston. 
shifting pins from one to the other of these. In the Knife- 
sharpener exhibited by Messrs. B. Reed and Co., a hunting 
tooth in the gear ensures an even wearing of the stone by pre- 
venting the points of the knife from coming repeatedly in contact 
with the same part of the stone. 
Messrs. Murray and Co. also exhibited a new implement, 
No. 1508, in which a small coulter with double wings pre- 
cedes, and two covering coulters follow, their well-known 
potato planter. Upon land that has been ridged in the usual 
way, this machine, with the horse walking in the furrow, cuts 
open the centre of two ridges, plants the potatoes, and covers 
them up. In using the machine there is, of course, no oppor- 
tunity for putting the manure in with the potatoes ; but it will 
be useful where light sandy land has been manured in autumn. 
In a wet climate it may be doubtful policy to manure such land 
in autumn, and the invention may perhaps be of most service 
in the Colonies, where labour is scarce, or in very large fields 
on the Continent. 
No. 1559, Patent Combination Machine, by Mr. T. W. A. 
Evans, of Rumsey House, Kidwelly, Caermarthen, South Wales; 
price 18Z. Convertible into double mould-board plough, double 
turnip and mangold drill, horse-hoe for turnips and mangolds, 
and potato digger. Though combined machines are too often 
like Jack-of-all-trades — master of none — this ingenious arrange- 
ment may perhaps be adapted to the requirements of small 
farms in Wales, where the labour is chiefly performed by the 
farmer himself; on many farms it is too often the case with 
such machines that the different fittings are not to be found 
at the time they are wanted for use. 
No. 1560, Mr. D. Jones exhibited a Drill for Root Seeds, 
for which it is claimed " that it drops the seed with the manure 
where the root should grow only, not leaving manure for the 
nourishment of weeds all over the field." " Sowing at intervals 
of 18 or 20 inches, it leaves the plants at equal distances, both 
longitudinally and transversely, and allows the horse-hoe to work 
through the length and breadth of the land." The Judges did 
not submit this little hand-drill to a trial, believing that it is 
never desirable and seldom safe to concentrate in this way the 
whole of the artificial manure in spots just under the seeds. 
No. 1G54 is an Anglo-Canadian Corn Drill, by L. R. Knapp 
and Co., in which a clutch applied to each of the distributors 
enables the drill-man to shut off any single drill, or to stop 
the whole of them simultaneously. Although a similar arrange- 
ment has been for a long time used in Suffolk drills, it is said 
to be a novelty in Canadian drills. It will save much seed that 
would otherwise be wasted on the headlands. 
