674 
Report on the Exhibition and 
ordinary machines, owing to the direct pull the horses exert. 
One walks in the long grass, the other just outside : at the end 
Fig. 12. — Illustration of the Sicathv left hy the Eureka Moicer. 
of the field the machine turns, not being driven round and 
round as other mowers, so that the grass trodden down by the 
horse one time is effectually cut the next. The wheels are 
3 feet 6 inches in diameter. There are no bevil wheels, motion 
being imparted to the knife by a bell-crank, so either end of 
the knife is free to rise or fall as it likes, and is easily raised 
by the driver when required. A six-feet cutter-bar is used, which 
is supposed to be equal in draught to an ordinary 4 feet (i inches 
machine. 
Messrs. Richard Garrett and Sons, Leiston, have certainly 
made a step in the right direction in the shape of a Compound 
Portable Engine. Messrs. John Fowler and Co. and others make 
"semi-fixed"compound engines with the cylinders underneath the 
boiler, but this is the first true portable compound ever made, 
or at any rate ever exhibited in the Society's Yard. In a few 
words, the advantage of this system is obtained by using a high 
pressure, and expanding it down as low as possible. The great 
revolution v/hich the adoption of this method caused in marine 
engines, by reducing the consumption of coal by more than 
50 per cent., has been one of the chief causes which have helped 
on the importation of foreign food from long distances ; so if 
hitherto it has somewhat operated against the interests, of 
English farmers, the time may now have come when it will 
prove a good ally. The engine in the Yard was 10-horse-power, 
with cylinders 7^ inches and 11^ inches in diameter by 10 inches 
stroke. The cranks are at right angles. The steam pressure 
is 80 lbs. and the cut-off in the high-pressure cylinder is at half- 
stroke. The makers state that considerable economy in fuel is 
shown by this engine over ordinary portables, and no doubt at 
some future time the system will be brought more prominently 
under the Society's notice ; but a higher pressure of steam than 
80 lbs. must be used to get the best results, and as 150 lbs. 
is now constantly used in railway locomotives, and even in 
ploughing engines, why should the working pressure of port- 
