FENCES AND FARM BUILDINGS. 57 



of the trusses (eighteen feet) is entirely unobstructed, save by the 

 side braces of the three center frames, which were necessary to 

 give stiffness to the building. The feed-room, tool-room, work- 

 shop, and chamber are independent structures, seven and a half 

 feet high, with strongly timbered ceilings, capable of holding any 

 weight that it may be necessary to put upon them. The space 

 above the workshop, etc., will be used for storing hay, while that 

 over the feed-room will be used as a receptacle for cut hay, to be 

 taken up from the cutting machine, which stands on the main floor 

 west of the feed-room, by an elevator similar to that used for grain. 

 The capacity of the hay floor will be about one hundred and twenty 

 tons, besides ample space for wagons. The trap-door opposite the 

 door of the chamber corresponds with one between the rail tracks 

 on the floor below. Through these, roots are hoisted from the cel- 

 lar to the upper floor, where they are cut by a root-slicer. The 

 steam-box, grain and meal bin, etc., are in the feed-room, leaving 

 sufficient space for the mixing of cut food, and its delivery through 

 the trap-door to the rail-car below. A steam-boiler and a small 

 engine for driving the hay-cutter will be erected in a shed north 

 of the ox stalls, against the stone wall which, as already stated, 

 is, on this side of the barn, carried up to the upper floor. Greater 

 safety against fire makes this arrangement advisable. The reasons 

 which have induced me to adopt this method of preparing winter 

 food, and the details of the system will be set forth in the chap- 

 ter on " Feeding." 



One winter's experience with a Prindle steamer and a horse- 

 power hay-cutter has proven both the advantage of this mode of 

 preparing food and the necessity for better means for cutting a 

 large supply, and more abundant steam for cooking. 



A windmill of the style shown in Fig. 13, has been erected 

 over a spring one thousand feet distant, forcing water through a 

 pipe into a tank on the hay floor, communicating with iron water- 

 troughs, one in front of each pair of cattle stalls, so arranged as 

 to be always supplied with water, a system which has been in 

 satisfactory use for some years on the farms of Messrs. S. & D. 

 Wells, near Wethersfield, Conn. This arrangement for supply- 



