78 THE YOUNG FARMER'S MANUAL. 



seven, and then, with a circular saw, cut them off the length 

 desired, and bore them. But, when timber will split freely, more 

 caps can be made of a log by riving them out than by sawing, 

 when the log is about twice the diameter of the width of a cap. 

 The logs are sawed off the length of caps and split into quarters 

 with a beetle and wedges, and then with a cooper's froe, (Fig. 

 19,) an instrument used for riving timber, and with mallet, the 

 the caps are split out, by setting the 

 froe in the middle of the stick to be split. 

 (See SPLITTING TIMBER, 63 and 64.) 

 "When caps are split out, one side of 

 them will usually be thicker than the 

 other. The average thickness of the 

 caps is a matter of fancy. Some make 

 them one inch, some two inches, some 

 three or four inches thick. The thicker A COOPER ' S *- 



the caps are, the more they will aid in carrying up the fence to a 

 given height. If caps be made as thick as a rail, they carry up 

 the fence as much as one tier of rails, and at the same time sub 

 serve the purpose of caps, and make a fence stronger than thin 

 ones, which are liable to split very easily. There is nothing lost 

 in making caps four inches thick, for it requires much less timber 

 to make such a cap than it does to make a rail ; and a man can 

 split out four times as many caps in a day as he can rails ; and if 

 they be thick as a rail, they will save one rail to a panel the 

 entire length of the fence. 



88. The length of caps must be determined by the size of the 

 rails, the size of the holes in the caps, and the amount of worm 

 in the fence. These three considerations combined, will enable 

 the builder to cut his caps of the correct length. It is necessary 

 first to ascertain, if we can, what is about the average size of the 

 rails. If they will average from three to four inches in diameter, 

 the worm of the fence being from three and a half to four feet, 

 the holes in the caps should be from five to six inches apart. 

 Now, six inches between the holes, added to the size of the holes, 

 which are usually about four inches in diameter, makes fourteen 



