FARM BUILDINGS. 



329 



FARM BUILDINGS.* 



THEIR LOCALITY AND CONSTRUCTION. 



Thise, it is quite obvious, should be deter- 

 mined with reference to the objects for which 

 they are designed ; and these objects vary ac- 

 cording to the climate and staples of the coun- 

 try ; while much depends, too, upon the size of 

 the farm. Where capital will admit of it, the 

 better economy would be, however, to adapt 

 them to the full size of the farm, and no more ; 

 for although the good manager, the man of sa- 

 gacity and industry, fond of his business and 

 devoted to his domestic concerns, who begins 

 on a small farm with adequate force or capital, 

 may reasonably expect to enlarge his estate, 

 and might venture to plan hisFarm Buildings ac- 

 cordingly ; yet, in the great majority of instances 

 in our country, farms of more than 300 acres are 

 more apt to be divided than enlarged. This de- 

 pends, it is true, on the character — we speak of 

 the industrial character — of the owner, and the 

 aneans at his command. But, especially south 

 of the Chesapeake, land so generally comes into 

 possession encumbered with debt, or with capi- 

 tal and force altogether inadequate to its thor- 

 ough iitilization, that before the debts are paid 

 off and the estate put in good condition, the 

 owner pays the debt of Nature, leaving the wife 

 and children to pay all his other debts. 



Again : as to climate and staples, these, too, 

 must have their influence in determining the 

 plan of the Farm Buildings ; for clearly what 

 might be suitable and necessary on the small 

 farms in New-England, where a good aggregate 

 annual sale is made up out of notions — a few ap- 

 ples and eggs ; a little butter and cheese ; a few 

 pounds of wool and feathers ; a small nursery of 

 fruit trees ; a couple of fat cattle ; a few hun- 

 dred weight of pork, and a variety of odds and 

 ends, for which every farm may find a ready 

 market at a neighboring factory, demands a 

 very different suite of buildings from a farm of 

 much larger size, where the great staples are 

 sheep, or cattle and mnlcs, or hay, or grain, or to- 

 bacco, or cotton. But in general it may be laid 

 down that Farm Buildings should be placed and 

 planned with a view to the collection and pre- 

 paration of the whole produce of the estate, 

 whatever that may be, ready for the market, or 

 for use and consumption on the place — either to 



* For a more minute description of thn Farm 

 Buildings illustrated in this No. ace end of this ar- 

 ticle. 



(69:^) 



sustain or fatten the domestic animals, or as food 

 for the family — and, moreover, and no less im- 

 portant, for the purpose of collecting, saving and 

 preparing the manure for the use of the estate 

 in such manner that the full equivalent of all 

 that is taken from the land shall certainly be re- 

 stored in some equivalent form and substance. 



On some former occasion we have remarked 

 on the too common want of system in the ar- 

 rangement and plan of these buildings, they be- 

 ing, as well as the gathered crops themselves, 

 scattered here and there, without relation to 

 each other, or any plan of economy in the use 

 of them. How often have we seen, for the sake 

 of some momentary convenience, the hay 

 stacked, sometimes on the naked ground, along 

 the sides of the meadow, and the wheat or fod- 

 der in like manner in a distant corner of the 

 field — to be moved, load by load, from time to 

 time, as it might be wanted, and wasted on the 

 way, and the broken stack left in the mean time 

 exposed to rain and snow, instead of having it all 

 placed at once where the least possible after- 

 handling and labor would be necessaiy to place 

 it on the threshing-floor or in the manger. 



The farmer should reflect, that it is impos.sible 

 to handle any thing on his estate but at some ex- 

 pense ! Time is money, and there is a money 

 value in every five minutesof every machine on 

 his farm, especially animal machines, whether 

 man, horse, or ox. 



^V"itll inanimate machines, the cost of idle 

 time is less, because they eat nothing ; but men, 

 women and children, and all other living and 

 consuming beings on the place are sources of 

 constant expense ; and everj' fraction of time 

 and of labor, tliat could be more economically 

 applied, is a proper charge in tiiat account of 

 expense, which every farmer who values his 

 cliaracter and his credit, should keep with all 

 the .scrupulous punctuality and exactness by 

 which every respectable and intelligent manu- 

 facturer and merchant is at any moment enabled 

 to see whether, and how much, he is going 

 ahead or astern. To make every tittle of labor as 

 productive as the nature of things will possibly 

 iidmit, whether that labor consist in manual, in 

 machine, in water, or in steam power, is the 

 chief, the iuces.sant study of the manufacturer. 

 See how every pursuit except the American 

 farmer's, has been advanced by steam. Some 

 man. inspired by a contemplation of its uses and 



