200 
Application of Steam Power 
exact quantity required may be brought up and intermixed \vitl» 
the top soil. The crops are carried off and the manure carried 
on to the land with the greatest fai ility and advantage. 
The quantity that can be ploughed per day with power suit- 
able to a farm of 1000 acres, is 25 acres, and three men are all 
that are required to conduct the operation. This calculation, it 
must be understood, is based upon work which has been re- 
peatedly performed. And, moreover, when time presses, by ai 
change of men, double this amount, namely 50 acres, may be 
done in the "24 hours, because the operation can be carried on by 
night as well as by day. The great advantage of being able thus 
to break up the land in favourable weather, or for a rapid au- 
tumnal cultivation, can hardly be overestimated. This great 
i conomy of time is also available for reaping and carrying the 
crops in harvest. 
The rails, forming a guide to the implements, insure that every 
successive operation shall follow in the same line, or parallel to 
it. Rows of plants have been drilled by the steam machinery, 
and, when up, have been hoed repeatedly by the same machine 
with the greatest perfection, and at all stages of their growth. 
In fact, hoes can be, and have been, placed so as to cut within 
half an inch of the plants in hoeing them, without injury in anv 
single instance. 
The whole cost of the system may be divided into — 1. Annual 
rent of tlie rails, which, according to the inventor's calculation, 
may be put down at not exceeding 11. 4s. per acre per annum for 
H fai'm of 700 or 1000 acres, or 1/. 10s. for market-garden land, 
near London. 2. The interest, and wear and tear of the engines 
and implements, which may be set off against the same for horses 
and horse implements. And 3. 'I he cost of working the same 
(which is subjoined) will be found to be not one quarter of the 
cost of the same by horse power. 
Cost of the Guideicaij or Rails. 
In creosoted timber, lOZ, per acre. 
In hard burned brick and angle iron, 20Z. per acre. 
Cost of the operations for a Farm of GOO or 1000 acres. 
Ploughing 5 in. by 10 furrows (twelve j)loughs have been used, 
turning over twelve furrows simultaneously), Is. Id. per acre. 
Hoeing (150 acres could be done per day), Sd. per acre. 
Scarifying, grubbing, &c., Hd. per acre. 
Harrowing, clod crushing, rolling, bd. per acre. 
Drilling or dibbling seed, bd. per acre. 
Reaping (cutting and delivering) at GO acres per day, 8d. pei/ 
acre. 
