would never eat "that there
red clover as they calls apollyon;" but when the mangel swelled into
splendid crimson root and the cows throve upon the bright fields of
trifolium, he was as proud as any one, and he showed off the sleek sides
of the kine, and the big mis-shapen roots of the beet with the utmost
satisfaction.

Equal grumbling heralded the introduction of a threshing-machine, which
Captain Carbonel purchased after long consideration. The beat of the
flail on barn floors was a regular winter sound at Uphill, as in all the
country round, but to get all the corn threshed and winnowed by a
curious revolving fan with four canvas sails, was a troublesome affair,
making farmers behindhand in coming to the market. And as soon as he
could afford the venture the Captain obtained a machine to be worked by
horse-power, for steam had hardly been brought as yet into use even for
sea traffic, and the first railway was only opened late in 1830, the
time of the accession of William the Fourth.

The farm people, with old Pucklechurch at their head, looked at the
operations of the machine with some distrust, but this gradually became
wonder and admiration on the part of the Greenhow labourers, for
threshing with the flail was very hard work for the shoulders and back,
and Captain Carbonel took care to find employment for the men in winter
time, so that his men did not join in the complaint of Barton and Morris
that there wouldn't be nothing for a poor chap to get his bread by in
the winter. In truth, the machine and its work were a perfect show to
the neighbourhood for the first harvest or two, when Seddon was to be
seen sitting aloft enthroned over a mist of dust, driving the horse that
went round and round, turning the flails that beat out corn from the
ears in the sheaves, with which Pucklechurch and Truman fed the
interior.

All Greenhow was proud of its "Mr Machy," as the little Mary called it,
thinking perhaps that it was a wonderful live creature.

The neighbourhood remained quiet even when George the Fourth died, and
there was much hope and rejoicing over the accession of his brother, who
was reported to be the friend of the people, and to mean to make changes
in their favour. Poor old George Hewlett was, however, much exercised
on the first Sunday, when, in the prayers for the king, Mr Harford
inadvertently said George instead of _William_, and George Hewlett, the
clerk, held it to be praying for the dead, whic