Plowman

“ Laying Out Squares or Rectangles with the Plow. If a good plowman can be secured, very satisfactory work can be done with the plow. In some cases a man can be found who needs nothing in the way of a guide, except two or three stakes. But with a sufficient number of stakes and [Pg 106] a marker attached to the plow, good results can be secured by almost any plowman.
Furrows should be run both lengthwise and crosswise of the field, their intersections marking the place where the trees are to stand. At each one set a stake. ”

“ In the matter of plowing, the plowman usually went about breaking up the land for his neighbor, and in some towns a bounty was paid to anyone who would buy a plow and keep it in repair so that the neighborhood plowing could be done. ”

“ The ordinary modern plow used by the English farmer improves upon this rather in details of construction and material than in essential principle, though a new start in invention is taken by the self-acting plow, which no longer needs the plowman to follow at the plow-tail, and by the steam-plow, which substitutes engine-traction.
The plow, drawn by oxen or horses, and provided with wheels, has taken on itself the accessories of a wheel-carriage. But, when the plow is traced back to its earliest form of a hoe dragged by men, its nature has little in common with that of the vehicle. ”

“ The plowman can put in the time to advantage with the file and the next half mile will go along merrily in consequence. No farmer would continue to chop wood all day without whetting his axe, but, unfortunately, plowmen often work from morning till night without any attempt to keep the cutting edges of their plows in good working order. ”

“ The beam was set at any pitch that fancy might dictate, with the handles fastened on almost at right angles with it, thus leaving the plowman little control over his implement, which did its work in a very slow and most imperfect manner."
But about the end of the eighteenth century the world was beginning to need a plow that would do its work rapidly and well. Population was everywhere increasing and it was necessary to till more ground than had ever been tilled in former times. Especially was a good plow needed in the United States where there were vast areas of new ground to be broken. ”

“ In Switzerland the farmer's plow is a wide shovel, which scrapes up and turns over the thin earthy skin of his native rock—and there the man of the plow is a hero. Now here, by our St. Nicholas road, was a grave, and it had a tragic story. A plowman was skinning his farm one morning,—not the steepest part of it, but still a steep part—that is, he was not skinning the front of his farm, but the roof of it, near the eaves,—when he absent-mindedly let go of the plow-handles to moisten his hands, in the usual way: he lost his balance and fell out of his farm backwards ”

“ The people mend, repair and make everything by means of raw-hide. The plowman holds the single handle with his left hand, and in his right he carries a goad with a steel point on the end with which he persuades his team. The driver never speaks to his team, but if he wants the team to go to the left he silently prods the right hand ox, and vice versa. ”

“ The “hoar foe of the forest” may mean the man who clears the woodland for his field, the plowman, or the plowshare (“the iron which, in the shape of an axe, bears ill-will to the tree”) . See B. Colgrave, MLR xxxii (1937) , 281–83. The beak or nose is the plowshare; the wagon is the fore-carriage; the sharp point underneath is the coulter. ”

“ The plow of to-day has become more than a hand-guided, horse-drawn tool. It has developed into a real machine, mounted on wheels, with a disk or coulter wheel that cuts the furrow cleanly, means [243] for leveling the plow and regulating the depth of the plow, and a seat for the plowman. It works upon soil with the same precision that a planer works upon a slab of cast iron. The furrow is neatly sliced, lifted, and turned over with mechanical accuracy. As the furrow slice slides over the moldboard of the plow the soil is pulverized by friction. ”

“ Within the limits of this county two small subterranean long-hidden stores of flint implements have been recovered by the plow during the last two years. In the alluvial soil of Central Illinois, so destitute of surface rock, a stone of any kind turned up by the plow is of so rare occurrence as to at once attract the attention of any plowman, but unfortunately many valuable specimens so found excite but momentary notice and are again lost. ”

“ They still plowed the brown clay at the top and left the slope wild, though there were many changes. And the furrows were wonderfully straight still. And half he watched a thorn tree ahead as he plowed and half he took in the whole hill sloping south and the wide lands below it, far beyond which was the sea. They had a railway now down in the valley. The sunlight glittering near the end of winter shone on a train that was marked with great white squares and red crosses on them.
John Plowman stopped his horses and looked at the train. "An ambulance train," he said, "coming up from the coast." ”

“ Next morning early Jack asked how he'd be employed that day. "You are to be holding the plow in that fallow, outside the paddock." The master went over about nine o'clock to see what kind of a plowman was Jack, and what did he see but the little boy driving the bastes, and the sock and coulter of the plow skimming along the sod, and Jack pulling ding-dong agin' the horses.
"What are you doing, you contrary thief?" said the master.
"An' ain't I strivin' to hold this divil of a plow, as you told me; but that ounkrawn of a boy keeps whipping on the bastes in spite of all I say ”

“ The great gang plow drawn by steam marked the last step in the development of the plow. The forked stick drawn by human hands and making its feeble scratch on the ground had grown until it had become a mighty machine drawn across the field by an unseen force and leaving in its wake a broad belt of deeply-plowed and well-broken soil. ”

“ The construction of plows has since been taken up by a multitude of inventors, the most valuable of improvements, probably, coming through the use of chilled iron, and the most promising from the application of steam-power to plowing. The increase in the working power of the farmer, from American improvements in plows, may be estimated from the fact that two million plowmen, with as many teams, would need to work every day in the year with the primitive plow to prepare the soil annually under cultivation in this country. ”

“ The air is cold above the woods; All silent is the earth and sky, Except with his own lonely moods The blackbird holds a colloquy. Over the broad hill creeps a beam, Like hope that gilds a good man's brow; And now ascends the nostril-steam Of stalwart horses come to plow. Ye rigid plowmen, bear in mind Your labor is for future hours! Advance—spare not—nor look behind— Plow deep and straight with all your powers. Richard Hengist Horne [1803-1884]
THE USEFUL PLOW A country life is sweet! ”

“ The sulky plow is easier for the horses than the common plow; it makes furrows of different depths; and it has a seat for the farmer. Sometimes several plowshares are placed side by side and drawn by a large number of horses. This is called a gang plow. Steam and wind and water and even electricity are coming into use to furnish power for plows, in place of the animal power of horses.
"Well, Uncle Ben," said George one evening, "now I understand something about plowing and tillage. The next thing a farmer does in the spring is to plant his potatoes and corn, is it not?" ”

“ These plows are wooden frames, shaped somewhat like the bow of a ship—in fact, I have seen very fair clipper models among them—about fifteen feet long by ten feet wide at the base, and so light that, if the snow is not too deep, one horse can manage them. The farmers along the road are obliged to turn out at six o'clock in the morning whenever the snow falls or drifts, and open a passage for travellers. Thus, in spite of the rigorous winter, communication is never interrupted, and the snow-road, at last, from frequent plowing, becomes the finest sleighing track in the world. ”

“ But primitive man was not at all fond of labor and in the course of time he tamed wild bulls and horses and made them draw the plows. So upon another Egyptian monument of a later date we have a picture of a plowing scene in which animals are drawing the plow (Fig. 5) . In this Egyptian plow we see improvements upon the crooked stick of the Syrians. The Egyptian plow, you observe, has a broader share. It will, therefore, make a wider furrow and will plow more ground. Moreover, it has two handles instead of one. Taking it altogether, the Egyptian plow was a fairly good implement. ”

“ A wooden plow on wheels is used, to which often eight or ten yoke of oxen or buffalo are hitched, with a man sitting on the yoke of each team, and a man behind to guide the plow. Each furrow is turned so slowly that the amount plowed each day would not equal a few hours’ work with an up-to-date plow and a strong team of horses, while the furrows are never over six inches deep. ”

“ Boys are not competing for furrow prizes and the walking plow has gone out of fashion. The plowing at the Wheatland plowing match was done by men with riding plows. Only one boy under eighteen years was ready to measure his ability against competition. The attendance of farmers and visitors numbered about three thousand, which shows that general interest in the old-fashioned plowing match is as keen as ever. A jumbo tractor on the grounds proved its ability to draw a big crowd and eighteen plows at the same time. It did its work well and without vulgar ostentation. ”

“ To attempt to use this kind in wet, sticky land, such as was on my claim, would find the soil adhering to the plow share, causing it to drag, gather roots and grass, until it is impossible to keep the plow in the ground. When it is dry, this kind of plow can be used with success in the gummy land; but it was not dry when I invaded my homestead soil with my big horse, Jenny and Jack, that first day of May, but very wet indeed.
To make matters worse, Doc, the big horse, believed in "speeding." ”

“ The plow frame is hauled from one side of the field to the other, between the engine and the movable anchor, by reversing the action of the windlass. It is adapted to turning from two to eight furrows at once, according to the power of the engine and toughness of the soil. The amount of ground plowed by such a machine varies from three to eight acres a day for a three-furrow gang, according to depth of furrow from twelve inches to four inches. ”

“ It is as with a plow, that must travel many miles before the whole of a small field can be tilled, but with this important difference—the plow travels methodically up and down in parallel furrows; the eye wanders in devious curves, with abrupt bends, and the direction of its course at any instant depends on four causes: on the most convenient muscular motion in a general sense, on idiosyncrasy, on the mood, and on the associations current at the moment. ”

“ But the girls were silent, except that Dallas gave a sigh, deep and full of happiness.
Lounsbury glanced at her. "You like the place, don't you?" he asked; "even if——" He suddenly paused. Her palms were open and half turned upward. Across each lay a crimson stripe—the mark of the plow-handle.
For the second time she read his meaning. "Yes, I like the prairie," she answered, "if I do have to plow." And she stepped from the furrow to the unturned sod. ”

“ It is a scene of wide cultivation, teeming with an easy, ragged, and abundant life. The doleful sakiyas are creaking in their ceaseless labor; frequent mud-villages dot with brown the green expanse, villages abounding in yellow dogs and coffee-colored babies; men are working in the fields, directing the irrigating streams, digging holes for melons and small vegetables, and plowing. The plow is simply the iron-pointed stick that has been used so long, and it scratches the ground five or six inches deep. The effort of the government to make the peasants use a modern plow, in the Delta, failed. ”

“ But those people have no holy reverence for their ancestors. They plow with a plow that is a sharp, curved blade of iron, and it cuts into the earth full five inches. And this is not all. They cut their grain with a horrid machine that mows down whole fields in a day. If I dared, I would say that sometimes they use a blasphemous plow that works by fire and vapor and tears up an acre of ground in a single hour—but —but—I see by your looks that you do not believe the things I am telling you. ”

“ One advantage in riding plows in addition to the relief of such a load is less packing of the furrow bottom. On certain soils when the moisture is just sufficient to make the subsoil sticky, a certain portion of the furrow bottom is cemented by plow pressure so that it becomes impervious to the passage of moisture either up or down. The track of a plow wheel is less injurious. ”

“ The traction engine travels about on its own wheels, till it reaches the required spot; then it stands still and by means of a wire rope pulls the huge plow toward itself two or three hundred yards across the field, between the rows of cane. The thing cuts down into the black mold a foot and a half deep. The plow looks like a fore-and-aft brace of a Hudson river steamer, inverted. When the negro steersman sits on one end of it, that end tilts down near the ground, while the other sticks up high in air. ”

“ The walking plow should not have a tendency to run either in or out, neither too deep nor too shallow. For the proper adjustment as to width and depth of furrow, the plow should follow the line of draft in strict obedience to the pull so that it [139] will keep to the furrow on level ground a distance of several feet without guidance from the handles. In making the adjustment it is first necessary to see that the plow itself is in good working order. All cutting edges such as share, coulter or jointer must be reasonably sharp and the land slip in condition as the makers intended. ”

“ This small plow is made after the fashion of our large two-horse breaking plows, and is, as we are wont to say, right or left handed. Some farmers are too poor to afford a horse or mule; in this case they work an ox as if he were a horse, hitch him to the plow and drive him with ropes attached to his horns with as much precision as a horse or mule. ”