374 [AsSHMBLT 



Mr. Robinson said that all the western cattle feeders kept hogs 

 to pick up the corn undigested by the bullocks; that they often 

 are fatted ready for the knife in that way. 



ICE HOUSES. 



Professor Mapes — There is a great mistake in building ice houses 

 with walls filled with tan, straw, earth, or even charcoal, though 

 the latter is the best substance. But the best thing, as has been 

 fully proved by Mr. Tudor, the great ice merchant of Boston, is 

 hollow walls, containing a statum of air. Ice houses need not 

 be made below the surface if properly constructed above, and 

 made to contain a large cube of ice. 



Dr. Wellington — A cube of less than twelve feet, Mr. Tudor 

 says, can never be relied on to keep ice. Three or four dollars 

 additional expense in building will enable a person always to 

 have ice, when in a smaller bulk it would all melt. 



Professor Mapes— I have heard it stated that Mr. Tudor makes 

 ice in a tank built on piles above the ground, and takes it, when 

 formed, right on ship-board. 



Dr. Wellington — He tried that plan, but it did not succeed. 

 He built a tank some 1,500 feet long and 600 wide; the ice froze 

 bottom and top, leaving water or a hollow in the middle. 



Dr. Waterbury — I have seen an ice-house filled by letting in 

 water from a spring, gradually adding to the bulk till a solid 

 cake as large as the square of the building was frozen. Then the 

 roof was put on and the ice kept well. 



Solon Robinson — The objection in that plan is the difficulty in 

 getting it out. Some one proposed to furnish the city of New 

 Orleans by freezing flat boats full of solid ice, in the Upper Mis- 

 sissippi, and floating down; but he found upon trial that he could 

 only get the ice out by chopping it up so fine that it would melt 

 directly. 



The ice-cutters of Boston build in stacks near the railroads, 

 filling the interstices on the outside with fine hay, and covering 



