ered and the wheat was left lying in short rows on the ground,
behind the machine. The bundles had to be bound by hand and removed
before the machine could make the next round. This machine, though
simple, was the forerunner of other important inventions.

=The Hand Rake.=--The next type of machine was the one in which the
platform of slats was replaced by a stationary platform having a smooth
board floor. A man sat at the side of the machine, near the rear, and
raked the bundles off sidewise with a hand rake. A boy drove the team
and the man raked off the grain in sufficient quantities to make
bundles. These were thrown by the rake a sufficient distance from the
standing grain to allow the machine to proceed round and round the
field, even if these bundles of grain, so raked off, were not yet bound
into sheaves.

=The Self Rake.=--The next advance consisted in what is known as the
"self rake." This machine had a series of slats or wings which did both
the work of the reel in the earlier machine and also that of the man
who raked the wheat off the later machine. This saved the labor of one
man.

=The Harvester.=--The next improvement in the evolution of the reaping
machine--if indeed an improvement it could be called--was what is known
as the "harvester." In this there was a canvas elevator upon which the
grain was thrown by the reel, and which brought the grain up to the
platform on which two men stood for the purpose of binding it. Each man
took his share, binding alternate bundles and throwing them, when bound,
down on the ground. Such work was certainly one of the repellent factors
in driving men and boys from the country to the city.

=The Wire Binder.=--Another step in advance was the invention of the
wire binder. Everything was now done by machinery: the cutting, the
elevating, the binding, and even the carrying of the sheaves into piles
or windrows. There was an attachment upon the machine by which the
bundles were carried along and deposited in bunches to make the
"shocking" easier.

=The Twine Binder.=--But the wire was found to be an obstruction both in
threshing and in the use of straw for fodder; and, as necessity is the
mother of invention, the so-called twine "knotter" soon came into
existence and with it the full-fledged twine binder with all its varied
improvements as we have it to-day.

=Threshing Machine.=--The development of the perfected threshing machine
was very similar. Fifty years ago, th