ne a tM a A NR ttn A I a lt ie ft 
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ROLLER. » 
have an octagonal instead of a circular circum- 
ference; and they do their work better than the 
circular ones, on account of each turn laying the 
flat surface with a momentum on the ground; 
but they require a greater power of draught. 
Many wooden rollers, also, as well as many stone 
and many iron ones, are double, or consist of two 
pieces, placed in one frame, and performing the 
same action as one piece, but rolling indepen- 
dently of each other; and not only are these 
much more convenient in turning than single 
rollers, and less severe on the team, but they are 
more suitable for light soils or corn crops or 
sown grass, in consequence of their neither tear- 
ing up the ground nor injuring the young plants 
at the end of a field. 
Stone rollers of granite, or of hard, compact, 
crystalline trap, are very common in districts 
which abound with these materials, and are both 
very cheap and very efficient. They are usually 
made of from 12 to 16 inches in diameter ; and, 
including the cost of both frame and scraper, 
they are sometimes from 5 to 10 times cheaper 
than equally efficient wooden ones, or from 8 to 
12 times cheaper than equally efficient iron ones. 
They have the high advantage also of being 
easily and cheaply obtained of a great diversity 
ef size and weight and mutually proportional 
length and diameter; so that from 5 to 12 of 
them of different kinds, in adaptation to different 
soils or different states of soil or different kinds 
and conditions of land and crop, may be kept on 
a farm for the price of a single roller of iron or 
of wood. 
Tron rollers of the common cylindrical kind are 
the most common for gravel-walks, lawns, parks, 
and other land-surfaces which require to be kept 
firm and smooth; and they are also common for 
ordinary agricultural purposes, in some districts 
which are destitute of granite or compact trap ; 
and they possess the advantage of admitting a 
temporary increase of their pressure by means of 
suspending weights on their axis. They are made 
of great diversity of size and proportions to suit a 
corresponding diversity of tastes and purposes ; 
and one of the most approved, for ordinary agri- 
cultural uses, is double, or has two separately 
revolving parts, and weighs from 10 to 15 ewt., 
and is drawn by two horses; while another has 
three separate cylinders, each about two feet in 
diameter, and of the same length. As cast-iron 
rollers are liable to fracture when drawn along a 
rough road, in transit from one field to another, 
a small low-wheeled wooden carriage may be 
kept for the purpose of transporting them. 
Booth’s roller was invented by the late George 
Booth of Allerton, near Liverpool, and comprises 
five cylindrical pieces, arranged alternately three 
in one line and two in another, and so con- 
structed on the lever principle that they may 
be pressed down by weight, and possessing each 
a diameter of not more than a foot. “ Mr. 
Booth,” says Mr. Ransome, “ contended for solid 
IV. 
65 
rollers of very small diameter, as the most effec- 
tive in crushing the clods, and throwing the 
greatest weight on the surface of the ground. 
From this opinion I venture to differ, believing 
that whatever advantage may arise from small 
diameters, it is more than counterbalanced by 
the difficulty of surmounting clods and other 
obstacles, and their consequent tendency to drive 
them before the roller, which would also cause 
increased labour to the horses.” 
Spiked rollers are used to reduce the lumps 
and clods of clay soils. Those of the simplest 
form consist each of a single wooden cylinder, 
with spikes of about 3 inches or so in length, in- 
serted quincunxly or in some other regular order ; 
and these perform their work pretty well when the 
land is dry, but become clogged and inefiicient 
when the land is moist. But the better kinds of 
spiked rollers have each two cylinders, the one 
placed before the other, both armed with regular 
and mutually alternate rows of spikes, and the 
two adjusted so closely together as to intersect 
each other’s rows of spikes, and in consequence }: 
constantly cleanse each other in all their revolu- 
tions. One of this class, described in the Leices- 
ter Report, has rollers of about 9 inches in dia- 
meter, armed with eight rows of spikes, fixed in 
a frame, mounted on wheels of about 3% feet in 
height, and provided with an upright post wind- 
lass and power of pullies to raise or lower the 
rollers at pleasure. 
The Earl of Ducie’s improved clod-crusher has 
two parts or lengths in the manner of the com- 
mon two-cylindered iron roller ; but instead of a 
continuous surface, it has from end to end, round 
all its circumference, a series of square wrought- 
iron bars; and it presents the angles of these bars 
to the clods, so as readily to penetrate and re- 
duce them. It acts well in its proper capacity 
of a clod-crusher, and at the same time is useful 
for rolling or pressing wheat in the spring. 
Bartlett’s cultivator is a roller of 13 thin iron 
plates of 15 inches in diameter, each fastened to 
a circular block of wood 4 inches thick, 9 inches 
in diameter, and bound round with iron,—the 
plates and the blocks strung together on an iron 
axle, and made moveable upon it,—-and the 
whole adjusted in roller-style within a strong 
quadrangular frame, and subtended by a bar with 
fixed iron scrapers, which keep the roller con- 
tinually clean. This implement is said to be 
serviceable in the tillage of wet lands in the ex- 
treme south of England; and it may be made 
with plates and blocks of other sizes than those 
which we have named, or those adopted by the 
inventor. 
The double-jointed barley-roller is simply a 
variety of the common two-cylindered or three- 
cylindered iron roller; but is so constructed that 
the parts may revolve at opposite angles—and 
may also, for convenience in travelling or for any 
special purpose in tillage, be placed the one be- 
hind the other. Its framing, too, is often so con- 
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