34S THE FARMERY. [Chap. HI. 



US to carry it down the conductor to the earth without liarm to the budding, 

 ^ly own opinion is, that tlie area is much smaller than is generally suji- 

 j)(>scd. If a rod is erected at one gable of a barn forty feet long, projecting 

 ten feet above the jjcak, wc do not believe it would aflbrd the least protection 

 to the other end. 



If a conductor is erected ujion a dwelling, it should have a point ten feet 

 above each gable and each chimney, and then it is doubtful whether the 

 steam and smoke arising from a wood fire would not prove a better con- 

 ductor than a rod. 



We should not feel any protection from the very best lightning conductor 

 projecting ten feet above the roof, at over ten feet from it. Probably this 

 fact, that the area is very small over which protection extends, may account 

 for buildings being struck and destroyed which were furnished with well- 

 arranged lightning conductors. The area exposed was too great for the at- 

 tractive power of the rod. 



36S. Protection from Fire. — Tliere is no mistake about the matter of pro- 

 tecting buildings from danger of fire, whatever tliere may be about protect- 

 ing them from lightning. 



In the first place, have a careful supervisory care in building that no wood 

 IS allowed to be placed where it can be heated to a point of ignition. Here 

 is a case in point. In building a chimney upon the soft, damp soil of the 

 \Yestern prairie, where brick was too expensive to encourage excavating 

 down to a solid foundation, the mason suggested placing hewed timber on 

 tlie ground, to which I readily assented, as it would save brick, and being 

 two feet below the hearth there was no thought of danger from the fire. 

 So upon this foundation the chimney was built, and as it was built right 

 end up, it aftorded the opportunity of Laving large fires, though the fire- 

 place was but a small one. 



After keeping a hot fire through several extremely cold days and nights in 

 midwinter, we began to be annoyed by the smell of wood burning in a con- 

 fined situation. This continued several days, and began to be alarming, yet 

 no one Avould believe it could be possible that those solid oak timbers under 

 the chimney were being consumed by subterranean fire. Yet it was so, and 

 it was found impossible to extinguish the fire without digging up the hearth, 

 and with great labor working out the most exposed timber; and as the other 

 could not be taken out without danger of throwing down the whole chimney, 

 we saturated it with salt, alum, and lime, to prevent it from taking fire 

 again. 



This case we have introduced solely to prove how dangerous it is to allow 

 any wood to come near enough to the fire to be heated very hot, for wood 

 will ignite from heat, M-ithout any possible contact with the fire. Another 

 case : 



A gentleman in this city set a stove in a lower room, and conducted the 

 pipe through the room above, used as a nursery. For convenience of warm- 

 ing food he had a hole made in a slab of stone, just large enough for the 



