194 
Application of Steam Poicer 
For my own part, I see no difficulty in mounting a common 
portable engine crosswise upon a low truck, and its being made to 
drag itself slowly along the headland, the engine thus advancing 
sideways, always opposite the line of work. An endless cord or 
small wire-rope round a grooved rigger on the fly-wheel might 
transmit motion to the travelling digging-machine, and the cord 
or rope be held many feet aloft upon stands with friction-rollers. 
For getting a sufficient grip of the small light rope, Mr. Fowler's 
drum-grooves suggest a ready method. 
In this rather lengthy section of tlie paper I have endeavoured 
to point out the advantages to be looked for in a direct-acting 
rotary cultivating-machine, the difiiculties in the way of 
applying the motive power, and the attempts made at practical 
realization of what is simplest and most effective in principle. 
With so much evidence in its favour, and so much mechanical 
and agricultural intellect at work upon it, the revolving steam- 
digger has now every prospect of vanquishing all obstacles and 
entering upon a career of success. 
I now come to describe our present attainments in 
Machinery working Traction Implements. 
Under this head my remarks shall be very brief ; as results are 
of far more importance than the mere mechanical details of 
apparatus already well known, or previously described in the 
Journal.*. 
The Steam Ploughing and Cultivating Machinary of Mr. John 
Fowler, of 28, Cornhill, London, consists (as the reader is of course 
aware) of a combined engine and hauling drum at one end of the 
field, and a self-propelling perpetual anchor and pulley at the 
other ; both moving slowly along the headland, so as to be 
always opposite to the work, while the plough traverses up and 
down the land between them, being pulled by an endless wire 
rope."}- Instead of coiling upon a barrel, the rope is gripped 
by passing round grooves on a drum ; and this method of hauling 
the rope has been attended with the best results ; for the speed 
<jf the implement and the strain on the rope being thus steady 
and equal, the rope is able to bear a heavier load tlian when sub- 
ject to the jerking motion of winding upon its own irregular coils. 
And as no reserve of rope is required upon the barrel, and the 
two plies run parallel across the field, the quantity of rope re- 
* I must apologise to the various inventors for the hasty manner in which their 
iuachinery is ciescril)eii in tiiis section of niy essay: a sudden inlliction of illness 
liavinfT prevented me from adding fuller details. 
t See engravings of this apparatus in the Report on Implements at Chester, 
.Tournal, vol. xix., p. 
