This is probably "the sharp threshing instrument having teeth"
mentioned by Isaiah. The ears are then rubbed between the hands.
In this region the wheat was winnowed altogether by hand, and after
the wind had driven the chaff away, the grain was laid out on mats
to dry. Sickles are not used, but the reaper takes a handful of
stalks and cuts them off close to the ground with a short, straight
knife, fixed at a right angle with the handle. The wheat is sown
in rows with wide spaces between them, which are utilised for beans
and other crops, and no sooner is it removed than daikon (Raphanus
sativus), cucumbers, or some other vegetable, takes its place, as
the land under careful tillage and copious manuring bears two, and
even three, crops, in the year. The soil is trenched for wheat as
for all crops except rice, not a weed is to be seen, and the whole
country looks like a well-kept garden. The barns in this district
are very handsome, and many of their grand roofs have that concave
sweep with which we are familiar in the pagoda. The eaves are
often eight feet deep, and the thatch three feet thick. Several of
the farm-yards have handsome gateways like the ancient "lychgates"
of some of our English churchyards much magnified. As animals are
not used for milk, draught, or food, and there are no pasture
lands, both the country and the farm-yards have a singular silence
and an inanimate look; a mean-looking dog and a few fowls being the
only representatives of domestic animal life. I long for the
lowing of cattle and the bleating of sheep.

At six we reached Tochigi, a large town, formerly the castle town
of a daimiyo. Its special manufacture is rope of many kinds, a
great deal of hemp being grown in the neighbourhood. Many of the
roofs are tiled, and the town has a more solid and handsome
appearance than those that we had previously passed through. But