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Updated: May 13, 2025
In 1768 he came to the conclusion that most farmers began to cut their wheat too late, for of course cradling was a slow process scarcely four acres per day per cradler and if the acreage was large several days must elapse before the last of the grain could be cut, with the result that some of it became so ripe that many of the kernels were shattered out and lost before the straw could be got to the threshing floor.
Such as give an unpleasant shock to the cradle, as they roll from side to side of the riddle-box, are pitched out by hand, and after a glance to see that no gold sticks to their sides, are thrown away; but the smaller ones are left until the hopperful has been washed, so that nothing but clean stones remain in the riddle, and then the cradler rises from his seat, lifts up his hopper, and with a jerk throws all the stones out.
The latter has a couple of buckets or pans, which he fills alternately, always keeping one full and near the cradler, so that without moving his feet he can pick it up and empty it into the riddle-box. If the rocker have only one man, he must stop rocking after washing every pan and get more dirt.
Other grain was grown, such as rye, oats, peas, barley and corn, but principally for feeding. Wheat was the farmer's main dependence, his staff of life and his current coin. A good cradler would cut about five acres a day, and an expert with a rake would follow and bind up what he cut.
It was for her that we toiled from early July until late August, gathering the hay into the barns or into the stacks, mowing and raking it by hand. That was the day of the scythe and the good mower, of the cradle and the good cradler, of the pitchfork and the good pitcher.
Across the bottom of the cradle-box are two riffle-bars about an inch square, one in the middle, the other at the end of the box. The dirt is shovelled into the hopper, the "cradler" sits down beside his machine, and while with one hand with a ladle he pours water from a pool at his side upon the dirt, with the other he rocks the cradle.
One man working alone with a cradle ought to wash from seventy-five to one hundred and fifty pans in a day, and two men will wash twice as much. A pan may contain one-third or one-half of a cubic foot. Two men can work more conveniently with the rocker than one. There is enough work to give constant employment to a cradler and a shoveller.
He was a good ploughman, a good mower and cradler, excellent with a team of oxen drawing rocks, and good at most general farm work, but not an adept at constructing anything. Hiram was the mechanical genius of the family. He was a good wall-layer, and skilful with edged tools.
After having been well beaten in the tubs, the "dirt" is put into the hopper of the cradle, which is then rocked gently, whilst another party keeps up a constant supply of fresh water. In the right hand of the cradler is held a thick stick, ready to break up any clods which may be in the hopper, but which a good puddler would not have sent there.
Show me, if you can, Miss Fault-finder, but not fault-mender, a set of boys who will, on occasion, sooner chop a piece of logging and dress it for the crop, than my own children; though I say it myself, who, perhaps, should be silent; or a cradler that knows better how to lead a gang of hands through a field of wheat, leaving a cleaner stubble in his track, than my own good man!
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