1870.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
377 
the ice-house are of wood, those of the dairy are 
of stone. The floor of each room is laid in ce- 
ment with a slope sufficient to cany off the wa- 
ter. The drainage of the ice-house is collected 
and made to pass by a pipe, into a vessel in the 
daily, where the end of the pipe is always cover- 
■0* »■> ■V'- — y flfc 
Fig. 3. — PLAN OF UPPER PAKT OF ICE-nOUSE. 
ed with water. The water is allowed to flow 
through shallow troughs in which milk pans may 
be set. The amount of water would not be large, 
but it will be cold and ought not to be wasted. 
Its use will not interfere with the employment of 
water from springs or wells for the same purpose. 
The building represented in the perspective 
elevation, fig. 1, is 28 feet long by 14 wide. The 
ice-room seen in figs. 2 and 3, is 10 x 12 feet on 
the ground, and about 12 x 10 feet, including 
the space above the dairy. The sides of the 
building are 9 feet above the ground, and the 
hight of the dairy 7 feet in the clear. The out- 
side walls of the ice-house are made of 2-inch 
plank, 10 inches wide, set upright, having inch- 
and-a-half planks nailed on the inside, weather- 
boarded neatly on the outside, and filled with 
spent tan-bark or otherdry, non-conducting sub- 
stance. The partition wall between the dairy 
and the ice-house, and between the cool room 
and the ice-house, is half the thickness, and not 
filled. Thus forming closed air spaces between 
the studs. These spaces communicate with the 
dairy, by little doors near the floor and so cur- 
rents of cold air may be established and per- 
fectly regulated, entering the dairy on the side 
towards the ice-house. These, with a ventila- 
tor V, at the top of the room for carrying off 
Fig. 4. — SECTION OF ICE-IIOUSE AND DAIRY. 
the warmest air, will surely cause the tempera- 
ture to be easily governed. This description, 
with the engravings, sufficiently illustrate the 
idea to enable any good builder to carry it out. 
Milk— or Milk and Water ? 
It seems an absurd question to ask, whether 
we want our cows to give milk, or, milk and 
water. Yet this is a pertinent inquiry, which 
every one who buys or breeds a cow should 
answer. "We may divide cows into two extreme 
classes with reference to the quality of milk. 
To make the idea striking we say, one class 
gives milk, the other, milk and water ; while if we 
have reference to the quantity of milk given, 
we find almost as great a difference ill ono class 
as in the other. The milk of those cows which 
give enormous quantities, say, 25 to 30 quarts a 
day, is rarely very rich. Ten to twelve per 
cent of cream being about as much as we have 
ever known the milk of such cows to yield. In 
some cases it is extremely poor, yielding four 
per cent, or even less. It is not only among the 
enormous milkers that we find the milk-and- 
water class of cows. They are plenty among 
cows which yield eight and ten, twelve and six- 
teen quarts a day ; and there are thousands in 
the country valued by their owners as excellent 
milkers, which really yield only milk and water, 
and very thin at that. The milk is mixed with 
that of others at the time of straining, and the 
good wife never dreams that some poor, thin, 
bony, hungry cow, that gives only eight quarts 
of milk at her best, is producing a pound and a 
half to two pounds of butter a day, while the 
favorite of the herd, a whole three-quarters 
Durham, that gives ten 
quarts at a milking, 
does not add four 
pounds of butter a week 
to the family stores, yet 
it is true in many cases. 
"We ought to know ex- 
actly what percentage 
of cream is yielded by 
the milk of every cow 
in the herd. The dif- 
ference in the amount 
of cream and milk given 
by different cows does 
not by any means repre- 
sent the different quan- 
tities of fodder con- 
sumed by each. One lactometer. 
cow will increase her flesh and fat while another 
produces much milk upon the same food ; and 
the question is often one of the desirableness of 
flesh on one'liand, or milk on the other. 
No doubt it is a severe tax upon the cow's 
system to secrete such great quantities of water 
as some do. Hence, one giving great quantities 
of milk poor in cream does not get fat upon the 
food she consumes, any more than the rich milk- 
er. Besides, the proportions between cream and 
curd vary greatly, so that we may consider 
milk to consist of three prin- 
ciples; viz., cream, curd, and 
water, either of which ma}' be 
largely in excess of the others. 
For ordinary purposes it is 
enough if we know the quan- 
tity of cream; especially, as it 
gives a much higher value to 
the curd when made into 
cheese. — Our brief discussion 
of Lactometers in the June 
number, with the description 
of the very simple one used by 
Titus Oalces, Esq., elicited from 
a practical glass cutter, Mr. 
Wm. vom Hofe, of New York, 
this sketch of a very conven- 
ient one, which, while it is a 
little more expensive, has cer- 
tainly some advantages over 
the simple tubes. It is a com- 
mon, pint foot-glass, graduat- 
ed to hundredths, besides indicating the frac- 
tions of a pint. With this it is easy to see 
at a glance, not only the percentage of cream, 
but the measure also, in denominations easy to 
be understood. For instance, if it be found that 
a pint of milk yields: half a gill of cream, that 
statement is more clearly understood than if it 
were said that the milk contains 12'| 2 per cent 
of cream. In comparing the milk of different 
cows it is essential that they be tested while 
feeding on similar food in the same pastures, 
and that the milk of the same milking be em- 
ployed ; formany circumstances cause consider- 
able variations in the yield, and the test should 
be repeated when accuracy is an object. 
Saving Fodder. 
In many localities the drouth has made a short 
crop of hay, and though of excellent quality, it 
will not suffice to carry the ordinary stock of the 
farm through the coming winter. All the sub- 
stitutes ever used for good hay will be wanted, 
and it becomes farmers to make the most of 
them. Oat and wheat straw that are often al- 
lowed to rot upon the ground, or are used for 
bedding, make a very good fodder, and should 
be carefully stacked or stored in the barn at the 
time of threshing. If cut and mixed with corn 
meal or with wheat bran, cattle will thrive upon 
the feed quite as well as upon good hay. Those 
who have sowed corn fodder abundantly, have 
a good substitute for hay. Save what is left 
from the fall feeding. Make the most of the 
fodder from the cornfield, which is often dam- 
aged from careless stacking. It is not yet too 
late to cut salt grass and bog meadows, that 
are often neglected from the abundance of other 
feed. To be sure there is not much nourish- 
ment in these grasses, but there is some, and 
when run through the cutter, and mixed with 
meal or roots they serve a good purpose. Care- 
fully store the turnips that have been sown be- 
tween the corn rows, or by themselves. It fre- 
quently happens that a dry summer is followed 
by abundant fall rains, which come in season 
to allow us to make a large turnip crop. 
How to start or back a Heavy Load. 
— ■ 
A team will usually draw a much heavier load 
than it can back, and the power of a man ap- 
plied upon the wheel is an assistance constantly 
made use of both in starting and backing heavy 
loads. We have been observing with interest 
the six-horse and eight-horse teams drawing 
BACKING A HEAVY LOAD. 
immense blocks of granite for the foundation 
of the new post-office in New York, and have 
been surprised to see with what ease a single 
pair of horses would back the load which eight 
were required to draw. It was done in the way 
we indicate in the accompanying engraving; 
namely, by attaching the horses to the rim of 
the wheel near the top. Thus their power to 
move the load was doubled by the leverage upon 
