180 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST, 
[Mat, 
sparks and prevent danger from fire. This is a 
very desirable forge, as it may be attached to a 
chimney in the work-shop, and may be used near a 
bam at any season without the slightest danger. It 
Fig. 1.— SMALL FORGE (No. 10). 
•weighs 160 pounds, and costs $35. It may be had 
with a tight and loose pulley, to be run by horse¬ 
power as well as by hand. The blast of these 
forges is strong enough to burn either charcoal, or 
anthracite, or bituminous coal, as may be convenient 
Fig. 2.— LARGER FORGE (No. 11). 
to procure. The other large furniture of the shop 
should be an anvil and a vise. These are as in¬ 
dispensable as the forge, and are useful for much 
work that does not need a fire. Small anvils and 
vises for farm use are made by Messrs. Fisher & 
Norris, of Trenton, N. J. The 
vise to be preferred is the 
“parallel leg” vise, shown at 
fig. 3, which always takes a firm 
square grip, whether the object 
held is large or small. It can 
be fastened to the work-bench 
by bolts, and a small size costs 
$8.00. The anvils used should 
be chosen for their solidity and 
the excellence of the face. Upon 
this latter greatly depends the 
ease with which work may he 
done upon it, as a light hammer 
will do as much work upon a good 
anvil, as a heavier one upon a 
poor one. These anvils are from 10 lbs. weight, 
costing $3.50, up to 90 lbs., costing $10.50, for light 
work, and from 100 to 800 lbs. for heavy work. 
Warming Milk for 
At the various dairymen’s conventions every de¬ 
vice that promises to increase the yield of butter, 
or improve its quality, meets with a ready hearing, 
and is intelligently discussed. Among the topics 
considered at these meetings has been that of warm¬ 
ing milk before setting, or “ scalding,” as it is 
generally spoken-of. We can not here give the 
argument of those who recommend this treatment, 
it being nothing new, as the heating of the milk 
up to 120 degrees, or even more than that, has long 
been practiced in some of the best dairy dis¬ 
tricts in Europe. A visit many years ago to 
the Devonshire dairies, in England, where the 
famed clouted cream is produced bj a method 
of heating, led the writer to adopt a similar plan in 
his own dairy. This plan was described at the 
meeting of the American Dairymen’s Association, 
at Utica, in 1873, and has been probably adopted by 
some of those who were then interested in its de¬ 
scription. But from the various inferior meth¬ 
ods described at similar meetings the past winter, 
and from the numerous inquiries which were made 
by those who have no method at all, we have pre¬ 
pared the accompanying illustrations of the plan 
referred to. The general method is to place the 
pans upon the stove until the milk is warmed, but 
this obviously will only answer in very small dairies. 
Other methods are in use in some dairies where 
fancy butter is made, which are based upon the use 
of the kitchen stove, but these arc all seriously 
objectionable, as requiring too much handling of 
the milk. What is wanted is a plan that can be 
operated in the dairy altogether, without help from 
the kitchen stove, except to procure from it a 
quantity of boiling water, with a heated iron, by 
which the temperature of the water is maintained. 
This is done by the use of the apparatus described 
in this article ; this is not patented, and can not be, 
as it is the writer’s own invention, and is here 
published for the first time, for the public benefit. 
The purposes served by heating milk, are two¬ 
fold. All milk when drawn from the cow, pos¬ 
sesses an odor more or less strong and disagreeable, 
as the food may have been strong-flavored—cot¬ 
ton-seed meal, or turnips—or as the surroundings 
of the cow stable may have been the reverse of 
pure and sweet; and under the most favorable cir¬ 
cumstances, some odor is perceptible. If the odor 
is not allowed to escape, or is not removed, some 
portion of it remains in the cream and in the but¬ 
ter, giving it a disagreeable flavor, which can be 
easily detected therein by a sensitive palate. Again 
it is claimed that the cream from milk which 
has been heated, rises more rapidly and completely, 
and is thicker ; and the milk remains sweet during 
a longer time in summer. These are very impor¬ 
tant advantages, and if the milk can be heated at a 
6mall cost, and w ; th but slight trouble, they will 
amply repay both cost and trouble. The method 
consists in the use of a vessel of tin or galvanized 
iron, shaped like a large pail, as seen in the illus¬ 
tration, holding 12 or 14 qts. Upon the top of the 
pail, a common tin milk pan, holding some 10 
quarts, is soldered, forming the top of the pail. At 
one edge of the pail, and beneath the pan, a broad 
lip is made, at the bottom of which is an orifice 
leading into the pail. A coil of tin-lined lead pipe, 
a quarter of an inch in diameter, is made to lead 
from the bottom of the pan on the top of the pail, 
to the tap at the lower part. The coil is fastened 
in the pail so that it is exposed in every part to the 
action of the hot water, which is poured from a 
kettle through the lip into the pail. A recess is 
made in the lower part of the pail, which is closed 
by a slide door, into which an iron heater fits snug¬ 
ly. The heater is a bar or piece of iron, not small¬ 
er than a common sadiron, without a handle, but 
furnished with two eyes or rings, by which it may 
be lifted into the recess made for it. This heater, 
which is shown in the figure, is made red hot, and is 
placed in its recess immediately after the pail has 
been filled with hot water. The slide door of the 
recess is then closed, and the pail can then be car¬ 
ried into the dairy for use. The milk, as brought 
from the cow-stable, is strained into the pan above 
Fig. 3.— vise. 
the pail, and passes through the coil, in which it is 
heated up to 100 to 120 degrees, or even more, in 
proportion to its more rapid or slower passage. 
The milk escapes through the tap in a small stream, 
into pans or a second milk pail; a pail is better 
than pans, as when the milk is finally poured from 
APPARATUS FOR WARMING MILK. 
the second pail into the pans, it is thoroughly aired 
and freed from all remaining taint, besides it is 
easier to move a whole pailful of milk at once, 
than to move several pans at separate intervals. 
This plan of heating may be applied to the shallow 
pan or the deep can method of setting the milk. 
Make Shoes for the Plows. 
One of the reasons Why plows are so often left in 
the field, after the plowing is finished, until they are 
wanted in some other place, is the inconvenience of 
Fig. 1.—PLANK PLOW-SHOE. 
moving them on the surface of the ground. They 
are certainly awkward to handle on the road or in 
a rough lane unless they are provided with a shoe ; 
then they slip along without any difficulty. A 
Fig. 2.—LOG PLOW-SHOE. 
couple of plow shoes are shown in the illustration. 
One is made of a piece of oak or other hard wood 
plank, 16 or 18 inches long and a foot wide, nar¬ 
rowed and beveled at the front, and provided with 
