408 Fife Years Progress of Steam Cultivation. 
acres per day, and at a less cost per acre, than the stationary engine 
does, whether the trial be made with short or long furrows, upon 
a small or an extensive plot. But it compares with the stationary 
engine disadvantageously in this respect : in small and irregru- 
larlv-shaped fields it wastes more time if vou finish-up all the 
ground, or else leaves an excessive proportion of the area in 
headlands and angles to be tilled by horses. It is not true, again, 
that the stationary engine can cope only Avith small compartments 
of land without removal. ■Mr. Pike, of Stevington, cultivates a 
50-acre field, with the engine placed bv a pond in one corner, 
having no less than 2000 yards oi rope at once resting upon his 
porters. Mr. Sowerby, of Aylesbv, has grubbed a 48-acre field, 
with the engine stationed in an adjoining 20-acre field, which 
was also cultivated (makitig 68 acres in all) after simply turning 
the engine and windlass round. And Mr. Champney, of Gat- 
wick, Sunev, has grubbed and then cross-cultivated a 74- acre 
field (150 acres in all) without moving engine or windlass. 
Recent improvements, enabling the rope to be carried clear off 
the ground, have placed the stationary engine nearer upon a level 
with the moveable engine in dealing with large plots: but still 
(owing to the pulleys as well as the rope) there is a greater waste 
of motive power in the roundabout than in the direct system of 
hauling ; and this limits the area which it is advisable to em- 
brace with a stationary- engine apparatus at one " setting down." 
The length of rope, however, in a moveable-engine apparatus is 
limited only by one, not by two dimensions (bv the length only, not 
by the breadth) of the surface tilled. Instead of encompassing all 
or most part of the area (as in the stationarv-engine plan) the rope 
merely doubles the lengfh of the furrow ; and thus 800 or 1000 
yards, or any given C|uantity of rope, might plough, with the 
moveable engine and anchorage, any number of acres ; that is, 
travel with a 400 or 500 yard furrow across any number of miles' 
, breadth of ground without one stoppage or removal. Hence the 
peculiar advantage of the moveable-engine system in very extensive 
inclosures. Mr. Frampton, pf Bensington, has made a road 
through an open tract of stiff clay, from which a long furrow's 
work can be done on either side. The engine can travel up this 
road, ploughing on one side, and return ploughing on the other 
side, accomplishing 150 acres in all, or about four weeks' work, 
without anv time lost in shifting apparatus. Mr. Redman, of 
Overtown, has a 160-acre field laid out in squares of 40 acres 
each, by cross driftways for the engine, which makes neat and 
perfect work completely up to the very edge of these roadways. 
Messrs.Blvth and Squier, of Stamford-le- Hope, with the permission 
of Mr. Cox, the proprietor, have within two years swept away 
the lO-acrc divisions from their 400 qcres arable, and laid the 
