This section is from the book "The American Garden Vol. XI", by L. H. Bailey. Also available from Amazon: American Horticultural Society A to Z Encyclopedia of Garden Plants.
It is eight feet long and four feet wide, made of two-inch plank, with a hard-wood cleat three inches wide and an inch thick on the bottom. The planks are nailed firmly to two pieces of timber, one end of each piece of timber being cut at such an angle that the plank nailed to it is slightly inclined, so as to be drawn over the ground more easily. The cleat is nailed to the middle of the flat part. It is drawn by two horses after the ground has been thoroughly harrowed, and crowds down the stones and grinds up any lumps of earth. It may be driven round the ground or back and forth. In using the drag the driver stands on it. It is useful in laying fields down to grass, the seed of which is the finest we sow. Labor is the great expense in farming, and the less we can use the better we can compete with those more favorably situated. We have got to manage better and be sharper than before we were subjected to such competition. A brush harrow would be better on top-dressed land than the drag. The latter needs the weight of the driver ; it carries a little wave of earth in front and fills up the horse tracks.
 
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