There are upwards of fifty various kinds of ploughs, such as cotton, rice, and sugar ploughs, two and four-horse ploughs, some of which have clevies attached to them, thus enabling the off-horse in ploughing wet meadow to walk on the solid ground, instead of a miry fresh ploughed furrow : they also answer for shallow ditching. There are double mould-board ploughs and subsoil ploughs, with wheel clevies and draft rod. One horse ploughs, with single and double mould-board ; the latter work excellently between the rows of root crops and corn, when not beyond 42 inches apart, as they turn the furrow both ways, thus doing the double work of a single mould-board. The plough, which, previous to 1848, had been so varied in its construction as to form the basis of claims for three and four hundred American pa tents, still continues to present slight modifications. But of the eleven applica tions patented during the year most are for minor points of invention. One of the most interesting of this class of im plements is the combined plough, remark able for its number of adjustments for the various purposes of ploughing and cultivating the soil. The instrument is susceptible of change from a combined plough into a cultivator, and with devices for several changes even as a cultivator. As a combined plough, it consists of a frame-work of wood for supporting the standards for the changeable reversible shares or teeth, the outline of which is of a rhomboidal shape ; the bottom edges of which shares are horizontal, and the forward points of which are turned to the right or left, inward or outward, ac cording to the direction in which the soil is to be thrown. A vertical cross section through the share gives the form of the letter S, so that, when running in one direction, it scrapes the soil up, and when reversed back side before, its oper ation is to smooth it down, answering the purpose of a roller, such as used for covering planted grain. The share part nos an upside down adjustment to fasten it to the standard, so that when the bot tom is worn out, the share part may be inverted, and used again for the same length of time. If used as a gang plough,
it has an adjustable landside to be at tached to eadh share, so as to guide the plough and prevent it from running to the right or left, as it might otherwise do. When the instrument is to be used as a cultivator for pulverizing the soil, the landsides being removed, the teeth or shares may be set. some inclining in ward and some outward, so that the for ward teeth may throw the dirt inward, for example, and the rear teeth throw it outward. When the teeth have been set to work as a cultivator, and it is re quired to use the instrument as a roller, or as a substitute for the harrow, for covering in or pressing down the grain, the tongue is reversed, and the instru ment becomes a substitute for the roller. Although this instrument possesses a great variety of changes and adjustments, only a limited claim couldbe granted for it.
A minor improvement has been added to the plough for ploughing among corn ; which consists of a common plough hav ing a cross-beam fastened near the for ward end of the beam, and two cultiva tor teeth projecting downward from the ends of the cross-beam, for the purpose of tearing up and loosening the soil. Between this cross-beam and the plough, and partly over the anterior part of the mould-board, and in a direction oblique to the line of the furrow, there is ar ranged a strip of wood or metal called a guard, the object of which is to prevent the large masses of earth thrown up by the plough from falling upon the young plants. This furrow guard is so elevated as to be above the ordinary level of a small furrow, and its chief merit seems to consist in its adaptation to ploughing among corn while the plants are so small as to be liable to be covered up by the ordinary plough, when used without such protection.