1874] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
257 
posts are now placed at e and / for door-posts, 
and at g two posts are placed meeting together 
at the top like a letter V inverted, and as wide 
apart at the bottom as may be needed for the 
door of the cellar. The frame is now finished, 
Fig, 2. — FRAME OP STABLE. 
and is shown at figure 2. Then a piece of tough 
low prairie sod is broken, and the furrow slices 
are chopped with an ax into pieces twice as 
long as wide. The perfect sods only are laid up 
outside of the frame into a wall as thick as the 
length of the pieces of sod; the joints are 
broken carefully, and all spaces are filled with 
Fig. 3. — STABLE FINISHED. 
small pieces of sod. Where windows are 
wanted, the frames are put in at five feet from 
the ground, as the wall is built up, and closely 
sodded around. The walls are built up closely 
to the roof of rails. A thick coating of prairie 
hay is laid upon the rails and covered with sods 
closely fitted together. This again is covered 
with several loads of coarse prairie hay fastened 
down with hay ropes or poles. The doors are 
hung upon wooden hinges, wooden latches are 
fitted, and all the crevices are tightly packed 
Fig. i. — THATCHING ROOF. 
with sod or hay. If wild cucumber- vines, hops, 
or other climbing plants are planted around 
the stable the building will be covered with a 
mass of verdure which will greatly add to its 
appearance. To fit up the inside, rails or boards 
are fastened to the rows of posts, b and e,which 
make an alley-way or feed manger, and a space 
is left between them so that the animals can 
put their heads through into the alley to feed. 
The cellar is then dug out, 
steps being dug in the earth 
for the entrance at g. The 
roof is supported by posts 
the same as that of the 
stable, and is covered with 
hay, then with earth, then 
again with hay and the earth 
that was thrown out of the 
cellar, until it is frost-proof. 
Shutes may be made at the 
sides of the cellar by which 
potatoes or roots may be 
unloaded directly from the 
wagon into bins. The en- 
trance, g, should be covered 
with a trap-door. The stable 
should stand east and west if upon an open 
prairie without shelter, and hay should be 
stacked upon the north and south of the west 
door. The door opening into the feeding alley 
is at A. Sods cut in the summer or fall are 
more durable than if cut at other seasons. 
Figure 3 shows the stable with cellar complete. 
When the roof is 
to be covered with 
coarse hay only, it 
may be clone in the 
manner shown at 
figure 4. That is by 
taking tufts of long 
hay, previously damp- 
ened, and laying them 
upon the rails, com- 
mencing at the bottom 
and working in a row 
from one end of the 
roof to the other. As 
each tuft is placed, 
the upper end is turn- 
ed under the second 
rail and brought over 
the first one, where it 
is tied by a twisted 
cord of the damp hay. 
When one row is thus 
laid, another is laid 
over it, leaving a few inches of the first row 
only to the weather. As the second row is 
laid it should be beaten down with a wooden 
paddle to compact it closely. To make a good 
job there should be at least six inches or 
more in thickness of hay laid upon the roof. 
Draft Irons for Plows. 
One of the most important points in plowing 
is to have the draft exactly right. There are 
many things which may interfere with the 
draft of a plow to make it take too much or too 
little land, or cause it to run into the ground 
too much or not enough. A proficient plowman 
ma}' be able to regulate this by altering the 
traces or otherwise adjusting the harness, but 
sometimes even this can not be done when the 
ordinary clevis is used. We give two illustra- 
tions of improved draft irons, by the use of 
which the draft may be regulated with great 
exactness. Fig. 1 shows one of these irons. It 
has a horizontal curved bar which is attached 
to the beam ; this is pierced with holes about 
an inch apart. A vertical draw-plate is also 
fixed to the beam by means of a pair of straps 
Fig. 1. — DRAFT IRON. 
and a bolt, as shown in the figure. The draw- 
plate swings to one side or the other, as may 
be recraircd to 
regulate the side 
draft, and is fixed 
in the place in £ 
which it is to be 
used by a bolt 
and nut or a pin 
and key. The 
vertical draft is 
regulated by a series of holes in the draw-plate. 
Fig. 2 shows a variation of the same principle, 
in which the position of the bar and draw- 
plate is reversed 
— the bar being 
vertical and the 
draw-plate hori- 
zontal. After 
having tested 
both of these we 
are not able to 
give a preference 
to one over the 
other, and it is 
a matter of taste or convenience as to which is 
the more desirable. Probably that shown in 
figure 1 will be the most frequently chosen. 
Fig. 2. — DRAFT IRON. 
To Build a Chimney. 
A correspondent writes us that his chimney 
" refuses to draw," and the smoke, instead of 
going up, curls downwards and pours out into 
the room for some time after a fire is built in 
the fire-place. The chimney is one of the old- 
fashioned ones, of large capacity, and that such 
a chimney should so behave is what surprises 
our correspondent. But this 
is just such a chimney as 
might be expected to do this. 
The fault is in having a throat 
of too great capacity. When 
a fire is made in the fire-place 
of such a chimney a current 
of heated air and smoke en- 
deavors to pass upwards. But 
in its passage it encounters a 
current of cold air passing 
downwards to fill the space 
vacated by the upward cur- 
rent. These counter currents 
mingle to some extent, and 
where they mingle curls and 
eddies are formed. The smoke 
is entangled in some of these 
eddies of cold air, and falls 
with them to the bottom 
and pours out into the 
room. If a current of air could be directed to- 
wards the fire-place from some part of the room 
sufficient to overcome this downward current 
the fault would be cured; but it is seldom that 
this can be done, and to get relief a radical 
change needs to be made in the chimney. The 
back of the fire-place needs to be drawn in, 
instead of being carried up straight, until the 
passage for the smoke is contracted to a few 
inches in width, as shown in the accompanying 
figure. As soon as the contraction is made the 
chimney is again widened to its full width. 
Then the warm current escaping from the 
throat passes upwards, and the counter current 
reaching the throat is deflected into the heated 
stream (as shown by the arrows), which carries 
it upwards with it, and so prevents it from 
reaching the fire-place and causing it to 
" smoke." In building a chimney this should 
