IN SCOTLAND.
231
be advantageously used for turning a threshing-mill. A re-spectable farmer in the county of East Lothian works histhreshing-machine in this way; and being situated in theneighbourhood of a colliery, he is enabled to thresh his crop
a trifling expence.
By the threshing-machine the toil of manual labour is ma-terially lessened, the stock of agricultural produce is greatlyincreased, and the facility of managing large concerns won-derfully promoted. The duty of rewarding the inventorwas therefore a debt incumbent upon the whole landed inte-rest of the country ; and, by the successful exertions whichWere made for that purpose, Mr Meikle and his family wereplaced in a state of comfort ; and thence ingenious mecha-nics, of all descriptions, must be stimulated to employ theirtalents in making useful discoveries, from the expectationthat their interests will not be neglected.
It may be proper to add, that, on the principle of Meikle’sthreshing-mill, a small machine has been made by Mr Wil-liam Johnsonj an ingenious mechanic of Langholm, in Dum-fries-shire, which costs only L. 8, is driven by the hand, andwill thresh from fifteen to twenty stooks of common grain perhour. This may be of use to small farmers, who cannot af-ford the more expensive implements.
It was before stated, that Mr Menzies was the first in Scot-land who made an attempt to thresh grain by the use of ma-chinery. Though it was unsuccessful at that time, there isnevertheless no doubt that it proved of public benefit; be-cause the attention of ingenious artists was thereby turned tothe same subject, till at last a perfect one was constructed.The like result, we hope, will follow the many attempts of ar-tisans to construct a reaping-machine ; and though these at-tempts have hitherto proved unsuccessful, yet, when it is con-sidered, that the period of at least forty years intervened be-twixt the first attempts, and the erection of a complete thresh-ing-machine, there is no just cause to despair of a properreaping-machin? being in time obtained.