674 ROCK COUNTY, WISCONSIN. 



which, to a great degree, has been overlooked. An ordinary- 

 farm house cellar is a poor place for keeping apples ; generally 

 it is too warm and damp, being more or less stored with pota- 

 toes and other vegetables, from which odors and gases escape 

 that apples readily absorb, and which tend to hasten tlieir 

 decay as well as to impart bad flavors. What seems essential 

 is to be able to maintain an even, pure, low state of atmos- 

 phere. The Birdsall refrigerator system is without doubt good, 

 but it seems rather impracticable for common use, as it is regu- 

 lated by ice, and just at the season when it is most needed the 

 ice fails. From the first of September to the first of Novem- 

 ber is the time of all the year when it is of vital importance to 

 know how our fruit is preserving, and although it may pass that 

 time without decay, yet if the late keeping kinds have been 

 subjected to a process of forced ripening, either on the tree or 

 anywhere else, they are not in good condition for keeping 

 through the Winter. 



*■ A FRUIT HOUSE. 



Having had three years experience in the use of my fruit 

 house, built in 1876, I will give a brief description of what it 

 is, and what it has proved to be. It is twenty-four by thirty- 

 three feet, two stories high, with a cellar below. The walls 

 are made of common fencing for studding, sheeted both 

 outside and inside. This space is all packed with tan-bark, 

 except at each of the corners, where a space is left to serve as 

 a ventilating chimney, having connection with the rooms of 

 each story by a trough or passage made under the joists of the 

 floors (they being sealed underneath). These cliimneys con- 

 nect with the open air, and are all provided with shutters to 

 be used at will. Furring is placed upon the inside sheeting, 

 and another lining of matched stuff, which, with double doors 

 and windows, makes a building almost impervious to lieat or 

 cold. While the building proves of great Value, I do not con- 

 sider the ventilating system complete ; for experience sliows 

 that the currents of atmosphere are not controlled upon the 

 same principle as fire or smoke in common chimneys. I there- 



