692 Report on the Trials of Implements at Reading. 
of the fans should be tried upon some description of corn ; 
and it seemed probable that these machines might succeed in 
drying sheafed corn which had been stacked in bad condition, 
and in cooling stacks which contained a good deal of green 
stuff, such as clover and young seeds. In broken weather, 
farmers are frequently tempted to stack their corn when 
it is only half dry ; and in wet harvests it is almost impos- 
sible to secure barley in which clover or seeds have been 
sown in really good condition, and at such times a great deal 
of corn is either spoiled in the field, or mow-burnt and seriously 
injured in the stack. Inasmuch as a large proportion of the 
material of a corn-stack is dead straw without sufficient sap 
to make it heat, and as, moreover, a stack of corn when first 
put together is much more pervious to the air than one of 
hay, there seemed to be fair grounds for supposing that ex- 
haust-fans would be working under favourable conditions if 
applied to stacks of corn. 
It was not easy to find in the neighbourhood of Reading a 
suitable field of barley in which seeds or clover had been 
sown, as the practice of laying down land with a crop of 
this description is not common. But Mr. Box succeeded in 
finding a good and bulky crop of barley in a field of about 
40 acres, on the Charville farm near Twyford, and in the occu- 
pation of Mr. Walter Wiggins, which seemed to meet the 
requirements of the Judges. The absence of green clover was 
fully supplied and compensated for, so far as regards these trials, 
by a plentiful supply of thistles, and a bottom-growth of hop 
trefoil, which seems indigenous to the soil, and a thick under- 
growth of weeds, or what farmers call " trumpery ; " and the 
crop was purchased by the Stewards for the purpose of further 
trials. 
The fans which were selected by the Judges to compete in 
this trial were those exhibited by Messrs. Coultas, Lister, and 
Phillips. 
On the 9th of August, the barley, which had not ripened so 
kindly and evenly as had been expected, was thought fit for 
cutting. It was not dead ripe, and there were some patches of 
the field which were certainly unripe. Much of the crop was 
so laid and twisted about, that the cutting was not very easily 
done. Messrs. Hornsby and Sons were good enough to lend 
the Society three of their " Indispensable " spring-balance self- 
raker reapers. The occupier of the farm always cuts his corn bj 
hand, and, living by the side of the highroad from Reading to 
London, he can always secure a sufficient supply of hands for 
this tedious w(;rk, but he has to pay a high price' — as much as 
I85. an acre being given for " fagging " a crop of wheat, which 
