he
attention of the farmer, when the severity of winter weather has put
a stop to the ploughing and the draining of his land. His grain
crops are to be thrashed out, and sent to the market or the mill. In
this part of his work Mr. Stephens has again availed himself of the
valuable assistance of Mr. Slight, who, in upwards of 100 pages of
closely printed matter, has figured and described nearly all the
more useful instruments employed in the preparation of the food of
cattle, and in separating the grain of the corn crops. The thrashing
machine, so valuable an addition to the working establishment of a
modern farm-steading, is minutely explained--the varieties in its
construction illustrated by wood-cuts--and the respective merits of
the different forms of the machine examined and discussed. With the
following, among his other conclusions, we cordially concur.

"I cannot view these two machines without feeling impressed with a
conviction that both countries would soon feel the advantage of an
amalgamation between the two forms of the machine. The drum of the
Scotch thrashing-machine would most certainly be improved by a
transfusion from the principles of the English machine; and the
latter might be equally improved by the adoption of the
manufacturing-like arrangements and general economy of the Scotch
system of thrashing. That such interchange will ere long take place,
I am thoroughly convinced; and as I am alike satisfied that the
advantages would be mutual, it is to be hoped that these views will
not stand alone. It has not been lost sight of, that each machine
may be said to be suited to the system to which it belongs, and that
here, where the corn is cut by the sickle, the machine is adapted to
that; while the same may be said of the other, where cutting by the
scythe is so much practised. Notwithstanding all this, there appears
to be good properties in both that either seems to stand in need of."
--Vol. ii. p. 329.

Other scientific, especially chemical information, connected with
the different varieties of grain, and the kind and quantity of food
they respectively yield, is incorporated in the chapters upon
"wheat, flour, and oat and bean meal," to which we can only advert,
as further illustrations of the intimate manner in which science and
skilful or enlightened practice are invariably, necessarily, and
every where interwoven.

* * * * *

And now the dreary months of winter