Once more he set to work on his long-neglected grain-binder, and in 1867 he drove his first completed machine into a field near Mazomanie, Wisconsin. The horses were fractious, and after being jerked along for several rods, the machine broke down, to the great delight of the spectators, most of whom knew Appleby and regarded him as a crank. But the machine had bound a couple of sheaves before it broke. Appleby displayed these, and one man--Dr. E. D. Bishop--pulled a roll of money from his pocket and handed it to the inventor. "Take this," he said, "and make me a partner. Your invention will be a world's wonder some day." All told, Dr. Bishop staked $1,500 on Appleby's genius, for which, twelve years later, he drew out $80,000. This was the first of the many incidental fortunes scattered right and left in the path of the self-binder, which began in 1880, to sweep forward as gloriously as the triumphal car of a Roman emperor. As for William Deering--the modest manufacturer from Maine, who in 1879 joined forces with Appleby, no sooner had he sold the 3,000 self-binders than he found himself floundering neck deep in an unexpected sea of troubles. There was not a flaw in the binders. They were cutting and tying the grain with the skill of 60,000 men. But the twine-bill! Three thousand farmers swore that it was too high. Twine was an item that they had never in their lives bought in large quantities. To pay fifty dollars--the price of a horse--for mere string that was used once and then flung away, seemed outrageous. It was like buying daily papers by the thousand, or shoe-laces by the ton. And so it came about that though Deering had reduced the cost of wheat ten per cent., he got little thanks for his superb machines--nothing but a loud and angry roar for better and cheaper twine. Deering moved against this new array of difficulties with quiet and inexorable persistence. There were only three binder-twine makers in the United States, and all warned him that he was pursuing a will-o'-the-wisp. But Deering pushed on until he met Edwin H. Fitler, afterward a mayor of Philadelphia. From the unassuming way in which Deering stated his needs, Fitler concluded that the order would be a small one. "What you want," he said, "is a single strand twine, which cannot be made without a new line of machinery. I regret to say that I cannot afford to do this for one customer." "Well," said Deering, "I think I may need a good deal in the long run, though I wish to begin with not more than ten car-loads." Ten car-loads! For a moment Fitler was dazed, but only for a moment. It was his chance and he knew it. Years afterward, he was fond of telling how he "made a million-dollar deal with William Deering in two minutes."