1907.] DISCUSSION. 85 



He said to me one day when I first undertook the work, " Now 

 Mary, if you will take care of those hens I wish you would." 

 " Why," I said, " I don't know anything about hens. All I 

 know about hens is that I like a hard-boiled egg once in a- 

 while." •" Well," he said, " if you will take care of them and 

 produce any eggs over what we need in the family you can 

 have them. You can have what you can make out of it." So 

 you see I had my interest aroused in the business at that early 

 period and commenced to give it careful study. After looking 

 over many different plans of houses I thought I would build 

 some of this type of house with the muslin curtains. It was a 

 success from the start. You know how it is with a pen shed 

 which is entirely closed except with an old-fashioned window 

 in front. We had some of that type. At that time we only 

 built the houses ten feet deep. Now I should build them 

 larger, I should built them sixteen feet. Fifteen feet square 

 anyway. At that time we only built them ten, the roosting 

 room being ten by eight, and with the expectation of accom- 

 modating about twenty-five hens. When we first erected this 

 kind of a house which I am going to describe to you they 

 served the purpose so nicely, and I became so pleased with 

 them, that the next year we put up a lot more. 



The next year I used a muslin that was prepared for a 

 veranda. It was oiled in some way so that the stuff shrank 

 right away from the nails and gave me some trouble by pulling 

 off. I used just plain unbleached muslin. I got strong, plain, 

 unbleached muslin and tacked it on to the frame of the house 

 very loosely. It is better to have it tacked on loosely because 

 with the shrinking which goes on in the cloth it will not pull 

 away from the nails. I have a photograph here which I am 

 going to show you. The muslin should be attached to these 

 frames quite loosely, or enough so that it will just wave in the 

 wind. One beauty of ^t is that it will not obstruct the light. It 

 will give about all the light that is needed. No wind goes 



