216 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[June, 
gether us in that shown at figure 3. Figure 1 
shows a crib iu very common use, built of round 
logs. For a stream of 50 feet in width the}' may 
Fig. 1. — COMMON LOG-CRIB. 
be made 8 feet, long and 6 feet wide, and for 
larger streams in proportion. The bottom of 
the crib should have at least four cross-pieces 
.resting on the lowest logs, to which they should 
be pinned with 2-inch, oak pins. The stones with 
which the crib is filled rest on these cross-pieces 
and holds the crib to the bottom. The crib 
may be built on shore until three or four logs 
high, when it may be launched and finished in 
the water, and kept iu its place with ropes until 
sunk and filled with stone. The logs should be 
all firmly piuned together. The cribs may be 
placed at such distances apart as may be re- 
quired by the velocity of the stream and the 
pressure of the water the dam is required to re- 
1'lg. 2. — CRIB OF SPLICED LOGS. 
sist. The intervening spaces may be covered 
by logs reaching from one crib to another and 
connecting altogether. Stone is then filled in 
between them, the bottom is made tight with 
brush and clay, and earth is thrown iu to fill the 
rear of the dam, or an apron of plank closely 
fitted is placed at an angle of about 30 degrees, 
with an apron also of plank at the lower side, 
and the top of the cribs is also planked over. 
Another serviceable dam is shown at figure 2. 
It is built of rough timbers, not in separate 
SILL. AND TOST DAM. 
cribs, but the timbers are spliced together as 
may be needed, and they reach quite across the 
stream. The figure shows a part only of the 
structure. 
Cross timbers are placed about 10 feet or less 
apart to bind the frame together, and are pinned 
or spiked firmly. These cross timbers decrease 
in length as the frame is built up and the sides 
meet at the top. The bottom is to be filled With 
brush and clay, and the front and rear planked 
tightly. This dam may be made to curve 
toward the current, which will add much to its 
strength. On the whole, perhaps this is the 
simplest, cheapest, and most effective dam of 
this character that can be built. Another 
method very suitable for small streams on farms 
where water power is wanted, or water for irri- 
gation, is shown at fig. 3. This is made by the 
use of frames consisting of a sill, a post, and one 
brace, mortised together. As many of these are 
needed as will permit them to be placed six feet 
apart across the stream. They are connected 
by planks 12 feet long spiked on to the sills so 
as to break joints, the ends of each alternate 
plank resting on each alternate sill at the lower 
side of the dam, and these form an apron on 
which the water fall?. Planks are fitted closely 
on the upper side of the posts, stones are filled 
which have been made in England with car- 
bolic acid. In a stable in which there were 
some sick animals and also well ones, sacks 
kept saturated with a solution of the common 
acid in 20 parts of water were bung up in the 
stalls before each animal, so that the vapoi 
could be breathed by them. The consequence 
was that the progress of the disease was stayed, 
and although the treatment did not cure the 
sick it preserved the health of the well animals. 
A Farm Poultry-House. 
" A Constant Reader" is in want of a poultry 
house with separate apartments for roosting, 
laying, and sitting, that shall be constructed 
easily and with a moderate outlay. Doubtless, 
many other of our readers want the same thin" 
and we present to them an engraving of a com- 
bined roosting, sitting, and laying-house, which 
we have found very convenient, in which we 
POULTRY-HOUSE WITH LAYING, SITTING AND ROOSTING APARTMENTS. 
in behind them, and planks maybe spiked on to 
the braces forming a sloping water way. The 
bottom should be made water-tight in the usual 
way by means of fine brush and clay rammed 
down, or plenty of earth worked in amongst 
the brush. If the plank covering of a dam leaks 
it may be made tight by throwing sawdust or 
fine tan-bark into the stream above the dam, 
and stirring it and the water together. Leaks 
in the bottom of a dam may be discovered by 
stirring a small quantity of sawdust in the water 
at the bottom of the stream, and noticing the 
place where it is drawn through by the current. 
Such a leak may be stopped by forcing a bunch 
of straw, marsh bay, or fine brush into the bole, 
and then dumping a few barrow loads of earth 
over the spot. Musk-rats are not likely to in- 
terfere witli such dams as are here described. 
A Home-made Barn-Pail. 
A correspondent favors us with a sketch of 
a barn pail which has the merits, far from in- 
considerable, of cost- 
ing no money and of 
being very durable 
and useful. It is 
shown in the engrav- 
ing above, and con- 
sists of a butter firkin, 
which, after filling a 
term of service as 
such, becomes of still 
farther use, and re- 
news its youth as a 
water-bucket. A stout 
hoop of ash is made to serve as a handle, by 
being affixed by wooden pins, as shown in the 
engraving. Such a pail stands much rougher 
usage than the ordinary pail, the life of which 
around the barn is but short. 
. i »«■ ►-• 
Carbolic Acid for Pleuro-pneumonia. — 
Now that the cattle iu New Jersey have become 
affected with this disorder, it is of interest to 
notice the result of some preventive experiments 
BARN-PAIL. 
kept 150 hens and hatched out nearly a thou- 
sand young chickens. For this purpose, the 
main part of the building, the roosting-house, 
shown in the engraving at the left hand, was 
12 x 1G feet, and 12 feet high at front, and 8 feet 
at the rear, witli a sloping roof. The floor was 
earth, a row of bricks was partly bedded into 
the earth, and pine scantling, 4 inches square, 
was laid upon them, with the ends halved and 
jointed together. These were the sills of the 
building. The boards were nailed to these 
sills, commencing at the corners, and scantling 
of 2 x 4 inches were nailed to them for plates. 
The building was then boarded up, rafters of 
inch-boards were let into the front and rear and 
nailed, sheeting of inch-boards and a roof of 
shingles was then put on, a door was fitted, en- 
trance holes with fly benches two feet from the 
ground were made, and a roosting-ladder of 
sassafras poles, on which, by the way, we never 
saw any lice, completed the whole. The whole 
was put up in two days. To this was added 
the open shed adjoining, and the sitting-house 
built iu the same manner, each of the same 
size, making the whole 48 feet long. Nests 
were provided in the open shed ami in the 
roosting-house, all of loose boxes painted with 
crude petroleum inside and out. When a hen 
"set," the box and its occupant were removed 
at night into the sitting-house at the right-baud 
iu the engraving, and placed on the shelf which 
was fixed around it. There she was kept shut 
up, but carefully attended to and watched, until 
the chicks were hatched, when, if she felt dis- 
posed, she remained as long as was agreeable, 
the chicks being removed as they appeared, 
and fresji eggs being put under her. In Ibis 
way, some hens brought out two or three broods 
before their patience was exhausted. This house 
was cleaned out at night, fresh food and water 
and sand for baths were put in, and in the day- 
time it was kept very quiet. When a hen left 
her nest, which rarely happened, she was taken 
out and another quietly put on. This may be 
done readily with Dorkings or Brahmas that 
are kept tame and used quietly. The house 
was whitewashed twice through the season, and 
