Report on the Trials of Implements at Reading. 
699 
number of props — had there been no cage in it, it might have 
righted itself by the settling down of the opposite side. As it 
was, the upper part of the north side was kept up, while, below 
the point where the props were, the sheaves all settled into a 
position which was nearly vertical, and a cavity, into which 
a boy might easily have crept, being left open, the air no 
doubt found its way in there and never penetrated the lower 
part of the stack. In the upper portion of this stack the corn 
was bright and uninjured ; though few of the sheaves were dry 
inside ; the lower portion, and particularly the north side, was 
much compressed and the corn was discoloured — the insides 
of many of the sheaves were almost rotten, and some of the 
grains had germinated ; the cages had tilted over to one side, 
and the condensed moisture had dripped down from the top of 
it on to the sides, and some of the barley lying near the cage 
had grown, and thrown out white shoots G or 7 inches long. 
Stack B was much less injured, but the fan seemed to have had 
no effect on all the lower part of it. Many of the sheaves were 
still very wet. 
Phillips's stacks were in the upper parts like those of 
Coultas's. The corn was not much injured, though if the 
stacks had remained unthreshed it must have moulded ; the 
lower part of Stack B, and particularly the east side for 
5 feet above the ground, was pressed as close as millboard, and 
the grain was heated brown ; all the corn in both these stacks 
had a most disagreeable fusty smell. 
Messrs. Lister and Co.'s Stack A had in it some corn which was 
about on a par with the better parts of the other stacks ; but a 
larger portion of it was damaged, many of the sheaves being 
very wet, and the lower part heated to a considerable extent. 
Stack B was in a frightful state, many of the sheaves were com- 
pletely rotten, and all the south-eastern quarter was reeking like 
a heap of heated farmyard-manure. 
The condition of those corn-stacks, when opened, showed 
very clearly that the fans had never had any effect upon the 
lower parts of them. They were so consolidated there that it 
must have been impossible for the air to penetrate, particularly 
as it had comparatively ready access through the lighter mass 
in the upper parts. It did not appear that the fanning had 
dried the insides of the sheaves in the least degree. Though 
the temperature had been controlled to some extent, it is pro- 
bable that in some of the stacks, in that part which lay below the 
thermometer tubes, a temperature considerably above what was 
registered had been reached. These tubes were originally put 
in at about 8 feet from the ground. When the stacks settled, 
