100 THE YOUNG FARMER'S MANUAL. 



cattle and horses. The builder, in building a board fence, can 

 always calculate for himself on the width of spaces. If cattle 

 more than one year old, and horses, only, are to be fenced against, 

 it will be entirely safe, unless animals are quite unruly, to make 

 all the spaces ten inches wide. In fencing against calves, the 

 spaces below thirty inches from the ground should not be ten 

 inches wide ; because calves, and even most yearlings, can thrust 

 their heads through a space of ten inches. 



119. We will now show by illustration what we consider as 

 economical, substantial, symmetrical, and tasty a board fence as 

 can be erected, when there is no ridge of earth along the fence. 

 We never consider a fence the most economical that can be built, 

 when it is necessary to build a fence from the surface of the ground, 

 that has not a ridge of earth below the boards; because a ridge of 

 earth twenty or more inches high may be cast up at less than 

 half the expense of purchasing other materials for fencing to such 

 a height, making no account of the labor of putting them up. 

 But as it is not always desirable, and sometimes very objectiona 

 ble, to have a ridge of earth beneath a fence, we will calculate 

 it from the surface of the ground. In all localities where animals 

 of every description are allowed to roam, lawlessly, in the high 

 way, a fence along the sides of the highway is usually required to 

 be a little better than the ordinary fences of the farm. Along the 

 highway it is often necessary to fence against all varieties of dis 

 orderly animals which belong to the dumb brutes of the fair crea 

 tion, saying nothing of fencing against bipeds, which are most 

 stupendously stupid, which run in the highways ; and consequently 

 a fence is needed which will offer a resistance fully adequate to 

 the exigency of the circumstances. 



120. A board which is sixteen feet long, four and a half inches 

 wide, and not less than one inch in thickness, if it is of sound 

 timber when made into fence, as it ought to be, will not give way 

 beneath the weight of a heavy man when he is climbing over the 

 fence, and it will resist a much greater lateral thrust than we 

 would ordinarily suppose ; and if the top board be covered with a 

 cap board four inches wide and an inch and a quarter thick, if 



