the cut grain fell in position
to be raked, or 'forked off.'

"This Obed Hussey machine cutting in a good average stand of barley,
June, 1835, was light draught for two horses and left as clean and as
evenly cut stubble behind it as the best of machines now do the same
work. But one fault, if any, with this first reaper was _the lack of
one or more cogs_ in the driving wheel that gave motion to the
sickle, which required the team to walk a bit too fast for teams of
habitual, or slow motion.

(Signed) "CLARK LANE."

[Sidenote: McCormick Late in the Field]

[Sidenote: McCormick's Application Rejected]

Regarding one who became a competitor of Hussey, much can be gathered
from the U.S. Patent Office. McCormick, who came comparatively late in
the field, when applying for an extension of his patents made many
admissions which were afterwards shown to dispute that he had
accomplished a successful machine before Mr. Hussey and others. He tells
us in his petition and brief to the Commissioner of Patents that he had
operated his machine in some late wheat in the harvest of 1831, but
that, although he was sometimes flattered, he was often discouraged;
that he did not make sales or sell rights because not satisfied that the
reaper would succeed well. He was not sufficiently satisfied of its
being a "useful" machine to patent the reaper; he tells us that its
construction and proportions were imperfect and its cutting apparatus
defective on account of liability to choke. He admits that the cutting
"proved not sufficiently certain to be relied upon in all situations"
until "the improvement in the fingers and reversed angle of the teeth of
the sickle" shown in his patent of 1845 were adopted. A farmer ordered a
machine to be delivered in 1841, but McCormick "did not then feel that
it was safe to warrant its performance." These facts are found in the
records of the United States Patent Office. Referring to Mr. Hussey, on
whose patent, among others, McCormick's application for an extension was
rejected, who proved to be a factor he must consider, he said: "I did
not interfere with him because I did not find him very much in the way,
calculated to beat him without, and supposed it might be best to do so."
Mr. Hussey, no doubt, took the charitable view and supposed Mr.
McCormick to have meant that his proofs would have been sufficient to
support him in his own rights. Mr. Hussey, the Quaker, wrote the Board
to whom McCormick's appli