Show FINGERS OF STEEL they are to supplant those of the ve gro in cotton the is three hundred and thirty iggers or spindles projecting through 1 and arora a hollow cylinder these fingers says the new york sun are ten inches long and have at the end a brush or tip of fine vire and set in four grooves jis horse hair clipped so it projects from the fingers about one twelfth of an inch the tip and the hairs on the side being the means of getting the cotton from the bolls the fingers or spindles are given a whirling motion by a system of coar gear within the cylinder amov ing forward the cylinder revolves the fingers come in contact with the cotton the whirling motion of the fingers entangles the cotton lint and it ib picked then carried upwards and backwards until cleaned from athe fingers by brushes and thrown into receptacles holding sixty pounds of seed cotton the revolutions are so timed that the fing ars which project at the spokes of a strike the plant without a raking motion for that would damage the plant xo injury comes to the leaf and boll from running the machine over plant I 1 with a width of four feet length seven feet and height of five and one half feet the machine complete weighs about twelve hundred pounds andis of easy draught for two mules in the morning when the cotton was slightly damp a gathering from one row made by the machine weighed a little more than thirty pounds the waste knocked on the ground by the machine was picked up by hand and weighed five ounces in the afternoon with the cotton perfectly dry the cotton picked weighed over twenty eight pounds and the waste picked zip weighed nearly three and one half pounds the time made was about five pounds a minute or three hundred pounds an hour allowing time liberally for emptying the receptacles stopping for repairs meals and so on the machine could easily work ten hours a day and would gather three thousand pounds at a total expense of not more than dollars per day making the total cost of the picking for each bale one dollar and fifty cents at present prices the cost is fully sixteen dollars |