aMEEIOAN AGRl'CULTUEiST. 
MR. KINNAERD’S SALE OF STOCK. ! THE PUMPKIN 
' 
The sale of Mr. James G. Kiiinaird’s herd 
of imported Short-horn cattle, took place at 
his farm, near Lexington, Ky., lately, in pres¬ 
ence of a large assemblage, whom the repu¬ 
tation of the stock had drawn together from 
various parts of that and adjoining States. 
COWS AND HEIFERS. 
Almira, red and white, calved in 1842, by D. Boone... $45 
Alice, white, calved in’44, by Daniel Boone.200 
Olive, red and white, calved in ’46, by Gratz.410 
Pedigree 2d, red roan, calved in ’47, by Sir Thomas.. .340 
Clarinda, light roan, calved in ’48, by Sir Thomas.340 
Arabella, light roan, calved in ’48. by Sir Thomas.500 
Olivia 3d, roan, calved in ’30, by Graves’s Comet.370 
Lncretia, red and white, calved in’48, by Comet Jr—150 
Almira 2d, red and while, calved in ’49, by Sir Thomas. 115 
Di Vernon, white, calved in ’49, by Graves’s Comet. .380 
Mary Tompkins, red and white, 10 years old, by im¬ 
ported Comet.210 
Caroline 2d, w’hite, calved in’49, by Daniel Boone.. .135 
Ceres, red, calved in ’50, by Daniel Boone.200 
Clarissa, white, calved in ’50, by Daniel Boone.155 
l.bila, white, calved in ’50, by Oregon.325 
Grace, white, calved in ’50, by Daniel Boone.100 
Pearl, roan, calved in ’51, by Redick..605 
Jeanie, red and white, calved in ’51, by Sir Thomas... 125 
Miss Bloomer, red and white, calved in ’51, by Match¬ 
less.185 
Rosetta 2, red and white, calved in’51, by Matchless.. 90 
Miss Fortune, light roan, calved in ’52, by Mercer.... 165 
Alba, white, calved in ’52, by Don, with a sucking calf 
by her side..’.240 
.Lively, light roan, calved in ’52, by Mercer.115 
Laura Wasson, light roan, calved in ’53, by Mercer . .200 
Martha, light roan, calved in ’53, by Mercer.160 
Belle, roan, calved in ’53, by John O’Gaunt, imported. .275 
Gazelle, white, calved in ’53, by Mercer. 85 
Wreath, red roan, calved in ’53", by Mercer.160 
Heroine, white, calved in ’53, by Mercer.110 
Red Bud, red and white, calved, in ’53, by Mercer.105 
Hinda, white, calved m ’54, by Mercer...'.135 
Modesty, light roan, calved in ’54, by Mercer. 85 
Jewel, light roan, calved in ‘54, by John O’Gaunt.510 
Olive Leaf, red and white, calved in ’54, by John O’¬ 
Gaunt..'.250 
Sylph, white, calved in ’54, by Fillmore..50 
BULLS AND BULL CALVES. 
President, red, calved in ’52, by Renick.210 
Earl, wuite, calved in’53, by Mercer . 85 
Express, light roan, calved in ’53, by Mercer. 40 
Young Nelson, roan, calved in ’54.130 
Stafford, white, calved in ’54, by Young Clinton, im¬ 
ported. 65 
Cerro Gordo, roan, calved in ’54, by John O’Gaunt_110 
SHEEP. 
Four Cotswold bucks were sold, ranging from $27 50 to 
$42 50; nine ewes, from $15 to $35. Eight southdown 
bucks brought from $12 to $50, and seven ewes, from $9 
to $17. [Kentucky Observer. 
An Extraordinary Crop of Wheat.— In 
every county throughout the United King¬ 
dom much has been said in favor of the 
wheat crops ; and in confirmation thereof, a 
large field of white wheat, grown this year, 
in the parish of Sessay, near Thirsk, North 
Riding, of the County of York, is one proof 
of the bountiful supply Providence has this 
year been so graciously pleased to bless 
us with. The field of wheat in question 
has been the admiration of every beholder 
thereof. People, rich and poor, from distant 
villages, who have heard of this splendid 
field of wheat, have, through curiosity, gone 
miles to have a look at it. Some of the 
straws, when standing, exceeded six feet in 
length, and the average length of the straws 
in the field would far exceed the average 
height of a man ; and many of the ears were 
upward of half a foot in length, and well 
filled, yielding between five and six score 
full-grown corns. This field of wheat be¬ 
longs to Mr. Smithson, of the Church Farm, 
Sessay. The seed was first introduced into 
the county a couple of years ago, by the 
agent of Lady Frankland Russell, of Thirk- 
leby Park, near Thirsk. [Credit lost. 
Gigantic Ear of Oats. —Yesterday we had 
handed to us a splendid ear of oats, which 
was cut in a field belonging to Mr. Cronk- 
shaw, of Belthorn, a neighborhood by no 
means celebrated for its fertility. The ear 
consisted of 200 grains. If we suppose 
these grains to be all sown again, and that 
they would increase in the same ratio for 
five years, the yield from a single grain would 
amount to 17,860 tons, estimating 500 grains 
to weigh anounce. [Blackburn Standard. 
At a late agricultural festival, in Ncw- 
Bedford, Charles T. Congdon, Esq., deliv¬ 
ered a pungent Poem, in which he thus hap¬ 
pily eulogises the pumpkin : 
O dear New-England ! who shall dare dispute 
Thy well-earned title of the Land of Fruit, 
When on thy hills yon glowing globe we see— 
Pumpkin or pompion"!—doctors disagree. 
Lo, where the verdant vines luxuriant run, 
He turns his fair round belly to the sun! 
Bathed in those beams he, comatose and caim, 
The bursting Falstaff of the blooming farm. 
Awaits his fate—the inevitable hour— 
The hand that plucks him from his native bower, 
Only exclaiming, could we hear Ins cries: 
“Take me to Bedford, and I’ll take the prize !” 
O yellow orb ! no hand divine is nigh, 
To snatch thee up and set thee in the sky. 
A modern star, uncatalogued and new, 
To fright the saints, and bother science too ; 
But. bide thy time !—when chill November falls, 
A voice shall issue from the State-house walls; 
And every parson, from his pulpit high, 
Proclaim aloud Thanksgiving day is nigh. 
Then, when around the dear domestic board 
Affection’s tide has tremulously poured ; 
When the fond mother—years of absence o’er— 
Clasps to her heart her wandering son once more ; 
When love, refusing longer to be pent, 
Smiles in the eyes a timorous assent; 
When laughing childhood, full of fowl and fun, 
Finds to its wonder that it can not run— 
’Tis then, O premium pumpkin"! then shall shine 
In splendor new this excellence of thine. 
Pie of my country ! still upon my breast 
Midsummer sunbeams in November rest; 
The magic circle of thy snowy paste 
Delights the eye and titillates the taste ; 
While through thy form the steel is raging bright, 
Our aqueous mouths are puckered with delight, 
And like faint soldiers who from fight would cease, 
We cry for quarter and demand a piece ! 
REAPING AND MOWING MACHINES. 
(Continued from page 35.) 
Reaping machines are either drawn behind 
the horses, somewhat like a boat on a canal, 
or pushed before them, after the manner of 
a wheelbarrow ; and the two plans have given 
rise to considerable controversy as to which 
is the best. Both have their advantages and 
disadvantages; hence the grounds for differ¬ 
ences of opinion, in the absence of experimen¬ 
tal evidence of a more lengthened and satis¬ 
factory character than has yet been obtained. 
True it is, that the former lias been in con¬ 
stant operation in America since 1833 ; and 
the latter, in this country, fora longer period; 
but, unfortunately, experience here was never 
called upon to pronounce judgment upon 
them until last year, at Gloucester, when she 
gave her verdict in favor of the “ cart before 
the horses”—a sentence which has this year 
been reversed at Lincoln ; hence the position 
which we are still in. Under such circum¬ 
stances, the golden maxim of “ Science and 
practice ” obviously demands that we scruti¬ 
nize the merits of both plans, without the 
expression of opinionative views on either; 
and this is just what we shall briefly endeavor 
to do, and, in order the better to accomplish 
it, shall, in the first place, take a cursory 
glance at the whole from the commencement, 
as we have done with the cutting and gather¬ 
ing apparatus. 
The Romans and Gauls, as has already 
been said, yoked the machine before the 
horses. The reaper, in this case, was a low 
cart with shafts, between which an ox was 
yoked in a reversed position. The cutting 
apparatus was placed on the top of the “ tail¬ 
board,” and was lowered or elevated by 
shortening or lengthening the backhand which 
supported the shafts. There being but one 
ox, and only two wheels, the machine was 
much more easily Controlled than the four- 
39 
wheeled reapers of modern times, pushed 
before two horses. 
Pitt, the example from “Walker’s Philoso¬ 
phy,” Boyce, and Plucknett, followed i 
Roman plan. The first Scold-GSi tip 
(Gladstone, 1806) is of the opposite kind, h 
machine being drawn behind the horses, an 
having two handles, like a plow, for regula¬ 
ting ihe cutters ; and Plucknett's second ex¬ 
ample (1807) appears on the same plan. 
Salmon’s (the same year) was, according to 
some, of this mode also, being pushed for¬ 
ward. It might, however, have been drawn 
from the fore-corner, as Mr. Scott’s subse¬ 
quently was ; and this appears to us to be 
the plan for which the machine was really 
constructed, if ever intended for horse-power, 
as it obviously was, although the imperfect 
description given along with every drawing 
we have yet seen, states the contrary, thus ; 
‘H, handles by which the machine is wheeled,’ 
being all that is said on the subject. Now, 
upon the drawing there are two handles, 
marked H H, obviously constructed for 
guiding the machine, on the principle of a 
helm steering a boat in a canal—a theory 
current at the time. The description is, 
therefore, at fault on one point; and conse¬ 
quently, we have some grounds to conclude 
that the word “ wheeled ” is a provincialism 
meaning “ guided ” or “ steered,” for ir. would 
be absurd to suppose that a man could wheel 
such a machine before him, or that a horse 
could be placed between two such handles. 
Moreover, part of the machine, at the fore¬ 
corner, is removed, to show the cutting ap¬ 
paratus ; and the appendage for attaching a 
horse may have also been removed, and the 
description of it omitted, as the descriptive 
references are, as we have seen, apparently 
hurriedly written. But whether it was drawn 
by the right-hand fore-corner or not, it may, 
with the assistance of the handles for steer¬ 
ing, have been so, giving to it an entirely 
new feature, which otherwise it would not 
have possessed, involving principles sus¬ 
ceptible of being easily improved upon ; for, 
by giving a reverse motion to the crank of 
the gathering apparatus, and placing a hook 
or ring for attaching the horses to the oppo¬ 
site corner, in returning, we have an automa¬ 
ton machine capable of cutting in both direc¬ 
tions, or from one side of the field, without 
interval, to the other, like the old Roman. 
The first Scotch example having failed, 
the next, in the north, is Mr Kerr’s (in 1811), 
pushed before the horses, analogous to Mr. 
Harkes’ at Lincoln. Contemporaneous with 
Kerr, we have Smith of Deanston, on the 
same principle. In 1815, Mr. Scott took the 
opposite plan, as already referred to ; and in 
the same year, Mr. Gladstone brought out 
his improvements of his first machine, still 
adhering to the same mode of yoking his 
team. In 1820, Mr. Mann followed on the 
same side, introducing a front wheel behind 
the horses. Subsequently, he was advised 
to adopt the Roman plan; but the proposi¬ 
tion did not meet with his own approbation, 
still less the trial, so that he afterwards re¬ 
turned to his original design. In 1822, Mr. 
Ogle yoked the horses before the machine ; 
and in 1826, Mr. Bell placed them behind it. 
It is rather singular to see the schoolmaster 
and clergyman thus opposed to each other, 
as it were, on the mode of draught, and then- 
descendants— Dray’s and Crosskill’s ma¬ 
chines—contending in the field for the prize 
at Lincoln ! Whether from the comparative 
success of Bell’s, and the influence of Mr. 
Smith, of Deanston, who advocated putting 
the machine before the horses, we will not 
say; but, in the north, opinion was generally 
in favor of this plan at this period ; and it 
appears to have extended as far south as 
Lincolnshire, where Gibson’s came out on 
this plan,in 1846. Indeed, throughout the 
kingdom, it was generally advocated until 
