THE YOUNG FARMER'S MANUAL. 181 



prietors have feasted on their own fruit and vegetables, which 

 they would never have tasted had their grounds been enclosed by 

 any other kind of fence. When a fruit-pilferer is passing a fruit- 

 yard which is enclosed with a board fence that he can hop over at 

 any place, he is sure to glut his swinish palate with anything 

 within his sight; whereas, had there been a picket fence he would 

 have passed on, and found his booty somewhere else. Horses, 

 horned cattle, and almost every other kind of animals, fowls and 

 other bipeds, which belong to a higher order of creatures, not ex- 

 cepted, which need to be fenced against, are usually more shy of 

 a picket fence than of any other style of fence. Dogs will many 

 times run many rods around a picket fence rather than junljp over 

 it, when, if a board fence of the same height were there, they 

 would have bounded over it without any hesitancy. This is par 

 ticularly the case if the tops of the pickets are pointed. Fowls, 

 in flying over a picket fence, generally aim to perch on the top 

 of the pickets, as they are accustomed to do on other fences ; but, 

 as pointed pickets are not very convenient for them to stand upon, 

 they soon learn that it is best to fly over without touching it, 

 which they seldom do, or keep on their own side of it. Filching 

 marauders, in quest of good fruit, fear the points of pickets, lest 

 they, by an inadvertant hold or step, should meet with 'their mer 

 ited deserts. 



1 69. In point of economy in dollars and cents, a picket fence 

 may cost more than a board fence, or it may not cost as much. 

 The height of each fence being the same, there will be little, if 

 any, difference in the cost of the rough materials ; but the labor 

 of building according to a given style will increase or diminish 

 that cost, according to the amount of labor bestowed upon it. 

 The style of casing and capping the posts, or not casing them ; 

 the style of rails and bottom boards ; and the style of the tops of 

 the pickets, all affect the expense of a fence, in proportion to the 

 amount of labor required in dressing out and preparing the mate 

 rials. There is often an unnecessary amount of labor expended 

 in making the tops of pickets very ornamental, by cutting them 

 of different forms, which only increases the expense, without 



