55o The Construction of Cow Houses. [oct., 



devoted. It is closely associated with the feeding and 

 milking of the cows; with the removal of the manure; and 

 more especially with the cleanliness of the milk. The area 

 required by a cow for her comfort is very much regulated 

 by her size, but all require about a similar number of square 

 feet for proper attention. With passages of the width sug- 

 gested for the different designs of cow-houses, a floor space 

 of from 40 to 50 square feet will be provided per cow, and 

 for the larger class of animals it may with advantage go 

 higher for some of the principal designs. These areas may 

 by some be considered excessive, but it should be remem- 

 bered that every increase in the floor space also adds to the 

 cubic space, and both materially assist in keeping the air in 

 the building in a reasonable state of purity. 



Cubic Space. — By sanitary officers cubic space has hitherto 

 been the standard by which they gauged the efficiency or 

 non-efficiency of a cow-house. Provided that this detail 

 corresponded with their ideal, little attention was devoted to 

 the other matters already referred to, which, have a greater 

 influence on the purity of the milk or health of the stock than 

 does cubic space. It is a very necessary detail of a healthy 

 cow-house, but it has hitherto been given an importance far 

 greater than it deserved. This has been brought about under 

 the mistaken idea that in a building with a large cubic space 

 the air remained approximately pure much longer than where 

 the cubic space was smaller. Where buildings such as 

 churches, halls, and theatres, &c, are occupied for a limited 

 time compared with the interval during which they are empty, 

 the inference is reasonably sound, but when applied to the case 

 of a cow-house in which the animals are constantly stalled for 

 half the year, it breaks down entirely. In the one case the 

 building is flushed with fresh air in the intervals between 

 its occupation, while in the other it is seldom that such an 

 opportunity occurs. The consequence is, that the air of a 

 cow-house, no matter how large its cubic space, reaches a 

 high degree of impurity in an hour or two after it becomes 

 occupied, unless provision is made for removing the polluted 

 air, and replacing it by that which is pure. 



This was strikingly brought out in the experiments of the 

 Highland and Agricultural Society during the winter of 



