Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1857-12-03

in the directions we have indicated Whe1
man is employed in turning winch he lift
the handle from the lowest point nearly hal
way up. When the horse exerts circular mo
ton, as in threshing machine, he acts BY
horizontal rectilinear draft-and when wind
water or steam are used to best advantage al
moving powers they produce vertical circular
motion. These ideas are strikingly illustra
ted and elaborated by the author Of worI
called ''Talpa or the Chronicles of Clay
Farm - mainly devoted to the subject O
draining. 1t is book that may be advan.
J tageously read by every farmer: He says
''mechanical power has no more business tc
be applied to, the pzoao, than horse power te
the spade 'tWhen horses have been
taught to dig, the steam engine may perhaps
be taught to pillow but nothing will be
gained by either; because it is NOT THEIR
MODE OF ACTION RESPECTIVELY" When the
first experiments were tried to propel YES.
sells through water by steam, the old notion
of oars still prevailed; but practice. soon
demonstrated that it was a defective appli-
cation of that kind Of power and resort was
and no one would think in these days of APP
4 plying mechanical power to fails to thresh
wheat or to the extremities of pump han
die to draw water. It may be said that the
locomotive steam engine. drays after it a
heavy train of cars. This is true, but it is
by vertical circular motion applied through
revolving wheels on hard surfaces; an en-
tirely different matter from dragging pillow
through the earth by horizontal draft.
! It is useless to point out an evil without
being able to suggest a remedy: The au-
thor to whom L have already referred pro-
poses plan which seems to me philosophi-
cal and eminently practical. It is to SUBJ
stitute for the plow revolving toothed cyl
inder-not rolling on the ground by its own
weight but driven by it's axis as the steam
paddle or circular saw-with span as broad
as clod-crusher, attached to small loco
motive, acting by the abrasion of the sur
face of the land and performing, in one ope-
ration, t'to complete work of communion,
aeration and inversion in the most light,
compendious- -narfect detail I will /,
however, give his notions Of this Implement
in his own language. Imagine" he says,
'ssuch an instrument (not rolling on the
ground butt performing Independent rero-
zutions, behind its locomotive, cutting its
way, drawn by surface abrasion, into SEMI
circular trench about foot and half wide,
throwing back the pulverized earth Gas it
flies back from a dog scratching at a rabbit
hole): then ina CINE the locomotive moving
forward on the hard ground with slow and
equable motion, the revolver behind with
its cutting points cease hartlenedD playing
upon the edge OF land side Of the trench as
it advances, and capable Of any adjustment
to coarse or fine cutting;' moving always
toryard. and leaving Jehind granulated and
Inverted by it's revolving motion a seed bed
seven or eight Tor more inches deep, mever
to be gone over again by any after implement
except the drill which had better follow at
once" He further adds: Il, am strongly
induced to feel that such an instrument
alone will ever fulfill the acquisitions Of the
steam, engine, which shortens and renaodezs
every labor it undertakes, and never con-
descends to old appliances except where they
are intrinsically perfect in their mode OF
action
In these views [ entirely concur and sim
cerely hope, for the credit of agricultural
improvement, that we shall hear of no more
abortive attempts to attach the steam engine
to the pZoec: but that it's mighty power may
soon be rendered available, by some practi-
cal means, for the cultivation Of land. Such
a machine could act best when the ground
is gerry dry-the drier the better-and when
it is in the best possible condition for break
ing up. We are often, by the force Of cir
cumstances, compelled to postpone the break
ing up of clover ley till late period in the
season and then to pillow when the lands are
too wet, by which they are seriously injured
and the crop badly put in.
The necessity of freeing lands from a SD
perabundance of water must have been ap-
parent in the early practice of agriculture.
The first drains were, no doubt, as they are
generally to this day, open bitches Or land
burrows, more or less deep: But the ancients,
to some extent, resorted to sub-drains, con-
lstructed of stone, wood, or, in some cases,
of tile, the remains of which may still be
found. In 1871 [ saw, in Devonshire,
cylindrical tile of coarse kaolin, which had
been employed by the Romans for that pur-
pose during their occupation of England !;
but their use on large scale and as regu-
lar system is of very modern introduction,
and although eminently successful, has, SO
far, been mainly confined to Great Britain
and Ireland, owing probably to the large
expenditure of money it involves, aohera the
acork IS aeeU done, for when inperfectly. it
is useless waste of labor and Materials
It has been found, however, to be the best
investment of capital that the landed pro-
prietor can make. It is bank that never
fails and drafts upon it are never dishonored.
| It is now received as an axiom in Eng
land that all lands, except those Immediate