They fall to the bottom, and
when the husks and vines are lifted off, and the dirt sifted out, there
are our beans or peas, ready to eat after being cooked.
"The stick with which the beating is done is called a flail. One part is
the handle, and the other part, which is fastened to the handle by a
leather string, is called a swingle, or swiple, because it swings through
the air, and beats down on the bean or pea pods.
"In the olden days wheat, rye and oats were threshed this way on a barn
floor, and in the Bible you may read how sometimes oxen were driven around
on the piles of grain on the threshing floor, so that they might tread out
the good kernels from the husks, or envelopes that are not good to eat.
But I'll tell you more about that when we get on the farm."
"When are we going to beat out my beans?" asked Mab.
"In a week or so, as soon as they get dried well, and are ripe enough so
that they are hard, we will flail, or thresh them," answered Daddy Blake.
"I am going to thresh some peas, too, to have them dried for this Winter."
Farmer Henderson left the flail which he had made for Daddy Blake, and Hal
and Mab looked at it.
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