154 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



and less opportunity for those huge, ostentatious structures, 

 that, whether they themselves ai-e ever filled or not, fill the 

 community with amazement, and usually have the title of 

 somebody's "Folly" conferred upon them with great pro- 

 priety. 



For a small barn there is less occasion for making an 

 actual division of the building. 



It does not pay to make a mountain in order to have a 

 "side-hill barn." 



With buildings well arranged, it will be less trouble to 

 bring in upon a light truck the food and bedding for the 

 stock, even if it comes from a considerable distance horizon- 

 tally, and to carry the manure to its dry shed in another 

 direction, than it is to drive around to the north-west corner, 

 up an inclined plane half a dozen rods long, swinging the 

 hay up towards the heavens, with ropes enough to rig a ship, 

 pitching it down from the "great beams" oyer the heads and 

 into the eyes of the cattle, with no end of dust, shovelling 

 the contents of the stalls into a steaming pit still lower 

 down, the same to be hauled out, with a great stress of ox- 

 flesh, on the down-hill side of the barn, and finally carted 

 around to the main level where it belongs. 



It is a mistake to suppose that houses or barns or mills 

 are any better for being piled one story above another. 

 Unless land is worth many thousand dollars an acre, it is 

 cheaper and better to keep the whole establishment as nearly 

 as possible on a common level. 



The days when the farmer tied two pieces of wood together, 

 and with that primitive implement j)Ounded out a bushel of 

 rye, put it in one end of a bag, with a stone in the other, 

 to keep the balance true, laid it across his horse's back, 

 mounted the whole, and rode off to mill, are among the days 

 that were. Farmers and their boys do not spend their even- 

 ings making flails, nor need they build " barn-floors " to swing 

 them on. 



The farmhouse of the future will be built mainly of bricks 

 and stones. It will l)e broad, and not high. The windows 

 will be large. Shade-trees will stand at a respectful dis- 

 tance, allowing the sun to rest upon it in healthful benedic- 

 tion. 



Each room will have an open fireplace, Avisely contrived 



