XIV 



THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE DAIRY BARN 



We may have a herd of excellent cattle and a 

 good farm but if the bams are inconvenient or 

 poorly adapted to their purpose, the entire business 

 will be unsatisfactory and perhaps unprofitable. 

 Satisfactory bams are rarely made in an archi- 

 tect's office. They grow under the hand of the man 

 who really knows the routine of harvesting crops 

 and caring for cows. The country, especially near 

 large cities, is full of so-called model farms with 

 very expensive and sometimes very artistic bams, 

 but most of them are models only of how bams 

 ought not to be constructed. Under the most 

 favorable conditions, doing the chores calls for a 

 rather appalling expenditure of time and energy, 

 but a poorly planned bam and stable may easily 

 double the labor. It should be said in passing that 

 farming is about the only business in the world 

 at which rich men deliberately play without pre- 

 tension that there should be a connection between 

 income and outgo. Many of these model bams 

 load every cow with an overhead charge for her 

 shelter which, if really charged against the busi- 



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