56 HANDT-BOOK OF HUSBANDRY. 



Stalls to within five feet of the outer wall. This floor is made of 

 slats six inches wide, placed one and a half inch apart. This 

 arrangement gives light to the basement and allows all of the urine 

 to run through, while the treading of the cattle presses through 

 most of the dung, the remainder of which is thrown through small 

 scuttle-holes near the outer wall. So far as I can judge from 

 over a year's trial, this open floor is excellent, though, had the 

 timbers been prepared for it, it would have been better to have 

 had the slats run lengthwise of the barn, as in that case they 

 would have given an equally good footing if only three inches 

 wide, and the space for the passage of manure would have been 

 doubled. 



It is intended that all of the horned cattle should feed from the 

 level on which they 'stand. Green fodder, or long hay, being 

 thrown directly on the floor between the front of the stalls and the 

 elevated border of the railway, the cut feed being given them in 

 tubs, which may be frequently set out in the sun, or, like the long 

 fodder, being placed on the floor, which, as it is free from obstruc- 

 tions, can be swept and washed out at pleasure. The cattle are 

 tied by the neck. Should stanchions be preferred, (and it is an 

 open question which is best,) they could still be fed in the same 

 way. 



The oxen are fed from mangers inside of their stalls, so that the 

 gangway between them and the horses, where the food is re- 

 ceived from the upper floor, may remain unobstructed. The 

 two loose boxes on the south side of the barn are of equal size, 

 with a space of about a foot and a' half above the partitions for 

 ventilation and for the lighting of the inner one, which has no win- 

 dow. The entire floor of these boxes is slatted in the same man- 

 ner with the floor under the hind quarters of the cattle. A rail 

 from the division of the stalls to the outer wall, at the center of 

 each side of the barn, may be used to separate the cattle of each 

 range of stable into two sections, each having its own door com- 

 municating with its own exercising ground. The hay floor, which 

 is reached by a very easy grade over the embankment and bridge, 

 has no center posts. The space from the floor to the bottoms 



