Class IX.]

■\VIXXOWIXG-MACHIXES—TURNIP-CUTTERS,

237

ascertain such figures, ami the comparison -will at least be

a fair one:—

s. d.

8 men, at Is. 4 d. - -- -- - 10 8

1 boy - -- -- -- -- - 0 10

2 horses - -- -- -- -- GO

Cost of barning - - 17 6

The price of threshing -wheat by flail varies, with theyield and the district, from 2s. 6 d. to 4 s. a quarter. Threeshillings then will not be an unfair average. If the rickhold forty quarters, we must add 5 d. for burning, and thecost will be 3s. 5d. per quarter.

In threshing with the unimproved machines, I find oninquiry that neither my neighbours nor myself havehitherto got out more on an average than thirteen quartersa-duy. The supposed rick would take, therefore, three

days to thresh :—

5 men, at Is. 4<7. ------£0 68

4 women, at 8r/. - -- -- -0281 boy - -- -- -- -- 0064 horses, at 3s. ------ 0 12 0

1 2 03

3 days’ threshing - -- --3 60Barning - -- -- -- -0 17 6

£4 3 6

The whole system of horse-machines has cost us, there-fore, 2s. a quarter. But improvement lias been carriedfurther: for steam-threshing we require additional hands,sixteen instead of ten, but we get over three times the work,passing the rick in one day, not three, through the machine.The figures on steam-threshing will be then as follows :—

1 engineer (head carter) - - - £0 2 6

10 men, at Is. Ad. - -- -- -0 13 45 women, at 8 d. - -- -- -0 3 4Coals, 3£ cwts. - -- -- -036

£12 8

If we make up this sum to 30s. for the use of the engine,the cost of steam-threshing will be 9 d.- the saving ascompared with hand-threshing, 2s. 8d., or with horse-threshing Is. 3d.-, an average of 2s. per quarter of wheat—a large saving certainly to be effected in one only offive main departments, but not larger, I believe, than maybe shown to arise from the use of improved machinery inmost, if not all, of the four other departments as well.It may be objected that credit is given for the value of thehorses’ labour; and though in valuations horse-work isoften charged high, we arc apt, I know*, as farmers, toregard each particular use of horses as costing us nothing.This view may be even correct on small matters occurringat leisure seasons, but it would be false if applied to ademand like the present, large in itself, distressing alsofor the horses, and liable to occur at all times of the year.It can have no truth in it at all, when we endeavour, andby reformed implements in all other departments areenabled, to reduce the permanent staff' of horses kept onthe farm : for this plain reason, that, if w*e do not carrythe reduction throughout, we either press the horses un-duly at one time, or require horses to be kept which areuseless at other seasons.

Since the trial for the Commission, a fresh trial hasbeen made at Bridlington . There the prize was awardedto a machine by Messrs. Clayton, Shuttleworth and Co.,which not only threshes out 50 quarters in a day’s work,but dresses the corn also to a great extent at the sametime, yet requires, as the makers state, only fourteenhands for both purposes; not more hands, therefore, thanwe have employed to get out with our horse-machines,and afterwards dress 13 quarters :—

d.

-Engineer - -- -- -- -- 26Feeder - -- -- -- -- -26

Six men, at Is. A<1. .80

Six women or boys, at 8d. - - - - 4 0Coals. 5 cwts. -*-------50

£12 0

If we add 7s. for wear and tear,* we find the wheat tobe threshed and winnowed for the almost incredibly lowsum of Id. only per quarter. Messrs. Clayton, therefore,have now taken the lead in the improvement of threshing-machines.

3. Winnowing-machines.

Even winnowing is become a refined process; for in-stead of trusting the corn to the wind, it is now placed ina machine so discriminating that the best of these, Messrs.Hornsby’s, required, on the part of the Judges at theYork meeting, specific terms for describing its work morethan are easy to understand; but the Judges’ account isfor that very reason worth quoting :—“ Several machines,”they say, “ were tried, but could not get through thegrain, shorts, straws, and chaff, as it came from thethreshing-machines, without being choked or requiringmuch more time than Hornsby’s, which did its work well,parting the whole into best com, good tail, tail, whites,screenings, and chaff, at the rate of about fifteen quartersan hour, and dressing over the second time at the rate ofabove twenty quarters per hour, parting the whole intosix parts, as before, in a workmanlike manner.” Suchmasterly mastication and digestion, making the contentsof our supposed wheat-rick, forty quarters, in five hoursready for market, must be appreciated by fanners; andMr. Hornsby’s winnower has not lost character at Ken-sington, as appears by the Judges’ Report:—

Winnowing-machines. —Messrs. Ilornsby and Son are, aboveall others, the most successful in these machines, dressingmore than double as much corn as any other in a rough state.Theirs is fitted with a spike roller, working through a grat-ing, and forms a sort of hopper, separating the com fromthe chaff in the rough pulsy state, as it comes from the thresh-ing-machine, without being previously riddled; and can beadjusted to suit corn either in rough chaff or in any otherstate; the second time over, a slide-board is adjusted in thefront of the grating, and is excellent for finishing the cornfor market. We therefore awarded it a Medal. Price13/. 105.

Mr. Gooch exhibited a machine which did its work well,but too slow.

C. B. Ciialloner.

The com being now fit for the miller, the task of areporter on agricultural implements fifty years sincewould have ended; nor is it within this branch to enteron the new process of grinding, by which the finest flouris produced from ordinary red wheat; but though thepreparation of food for man belongs to another depart-ment, there is an entirely new class of implements be-longing to this Jury which must not be passed over.

V. Machines for preparing tiie Food of Stock.

Formerly our farm stock was fed with hay, or turnedout to pick over straw, sometimes with whole turnipsthrown to them. But practice, anticipating Baron Lie-big’s brilliant discoveries in animal physiology, foundthat the labour of the jaws wasted the beast’s muscle andthus retarded his progress. Our stock, therefore, aresaved even from that exertion, and distinct machines havebeen invented for mincing each description of food withwhich the animals are made ready for market. Themost common of these is

1. The Turnip-cutter.

The test of labour saved cannot, of course, be appliedwhere the labour is applied to a new object. These ma-chines, however, have recommended themselves so widely,that to prove their advantages is almost idle. Still itdeserves mention that, in the opinion of good farmers,lambs fed with the aid of a turnip-cutter would be worthmore at the end of a winter by 8s. a-head than lambs fed onwhole turnips, the cost of using the machine being but Is.per head, and of the machine itself 5/. only. If this betrue—and it has not been disputed—this simple instru-ment gives a saving of 70s. an acre upon the turnip crop.Hitherto the Banbury turnip-cutter has stood almost alone,

* I am told that this would be a fair allowance for wearend tear on a farm of 500 acres, where the stenjn-engine isused for chaff-cutting, grinding, &c., as well as threshing.