114 THE DAIKYMAN'S MANUAL. 



store-room below for feed. A building twenty-four by 

 sixteen feet and sixteen feet high will be roomy and con- 

 venient. The cow stalls should be three and a half feet 

 wide and twelve feet long in all. It is well to have two 

 stalls : the extra one may be wanted for some other pur- 

 pose, if not for a cow. To preserve cleanliness the floor 

 should slope backwards a trifle, to a shallow ditch placed 

 four and a half to five feet from the inside edge of the 

 feed trough, in which ditch the droppings may fall. 

 This will leaye room behind for a broad passage from 

 which a door leads into the barn. The manure gutter 

 should drain into a manure tank outside. This is best 

 made with a brick wall and covered with a tight trap-door 

 to keep out flies in the summer. For this purpose, 

 too, some powdered copperas may be liberally sprinkled 

 over the manure and in the gutter. This will absorb all 

 the smell and destroy the larvae of house and dung flies 

 which would otherwise gather by thousands in the man- 

 ure. The feed trough should be two feet from the floor to 

 the top, sixteen inches wide and twelve inches deep, which 

 is sufficient to hold a full mess of cut grass or corn fodder. 

 In front of the feed trough is a partition four feet high, 

 and in this a falling door is made across the whole front 

 of the stall, on a line with the top of the feed trough, by 

 hanging one of the boards upon hinges and securing it 

 .■)y a cord, so that it can fall only to an angle of forty- 

 five degrees and so make a slide by which to put the 

 feed into the troughs. The feed passage will be three 

 feet wide and in front of the stall or stalls. It should 

 be provided with a neat, covered feed bin at the end. 



The remainder of the building may be used for various 

 purposes, for a carriage house if a horse is kept, or for 

 wood, coal, storage, etc. A stairway may be made in 

 one corner leading to the upper floor, and the pump and 

 cistern may be conveniently placed under it. Where 

 only one cow is kept, a very cheap shed with no upper 



