so thick a substance as liquid manure might pass easily in them to the tank. The drains are seen to run in straight lines from the tank to each suite of courts, such as directly into each of the large courts I and K, to the courts of the byres Q and Y, and to the ends of the hammels M and N, along the middle of which run the drains in connexion with those from the tank. The drains are built in the form given in fig. 72, and at the hollowest point of each court, great and small, is a grating, like fig. 71, placed over the drain to receive the drainage from the dung-litter, when an excess of moisture occurs beyond what the straw can retain. 2063. Tanks are not required on every kind of farm. On carse-farms, where much straw and little green food is used, there can be no liquid manure; and on pastoral-farms, the stock confined in winter in the steading are too limited in number to afford much of that material. On dairy-farms, on the other hand, where many cows are maintained, and much green food consumed by them in byres, tanks should be constructed for the advantage of the grass land. The practice of the farmers of Flanders might be usefully followed on all small dairy-farms, by constructing a small tank under ground in every byre, the contents of which might be enriched with rape-cake and other valuable ingredients. These enriched contents, employed as a top-dressing on pasture and forage land, would increase their produce, for the support of the cows, very considerably. A tank to a dairy-farm seems, therefore, indispensable, and it should be of large dimensions, to meet any enlargement of the dairy. On farms of mixed husbandry, if the steading is furnished with rain-water spouts, and the stock well supplied with litter, I do not see that much liquid manure can be collected. I had a circular tank of 12 feet in diameter and 4 feet deep, connected with well-planned courts by neatly-built drains provided with good gratings, and the courts were defended from being deluged with rain water by capacious rain-water spouts, and care taken that the cattle were always provided with a sufficient quantity of litter-with all which accommodations every well constructed steading should be supplied. The tank was not filled in the course of the season above three times a quantity not worth while providing a liquid-manure cart to take it to the field; and even this small quantity was solely derivable from heavy rains and melting snows for a few days falling directly into the courts, and causing a surplus of water, which was readily conveyed into the tank by the drains. The ordinary supply of the liquid manure was merely a few drops from the sole of the drain into which all the other drains merged. The sole of this drain was only 4 feet above the bottom of the tank, and, except after rain or snow, the liquid manure never reached that height. Still, wherever cattle are housed and fed in large numbers on turnips, a tank should be constructed with drains, to keep the courts comfortably dry. 2064. There are several circumstances to be taken into consideration, before proceeding to construct a tank for liquid manure. When a tank is made deep, such as a well, the building of the lower part will require to be particularly strong, to resist the hydrostatic pressure of the fluid within it, and, of course, will be so much the more expensive in construction. A tank should therefore be shallow, not deeper than four or five feet below the sole of the drains which bring the liquid manure. It is very desirable to have the tank covered, for the sake of protection against accidents, and against undue action of the atmosphere upon the liquid. The most durable covering is an arch; and, to keep the cost of that within bounds, the tank should be narrow, not exceeding six feet. The desired capacity of a tank will thus be attainable by extending its length. A tank should neither let in nor let out liquid. To prevent its letting in water, a drain should be formed where there is the least appearance of it in oozings or a spring; and to prevent the liquid getting out, a puddling of clay should be used, where the subsoil does not consist of tenacious boulder clay. The clay for puddling should be well pugged, or beaten into the consistency of putty. 2065. You will find the particular instructions for the construction of tanks below, and all I shall say here is, that a fall from 6 inches to a foot is required along the floor, according to its length; and that a roomy man-hole should be made in the arch of the roof, at each end of the tank, and at the deepest end a third opening for the pump. 2066. The pump used in tanks is generally the common cast-iron one; but I have seen a pump lately, of a construction well adapted for the lifting of liquid manure, which at times contains so much sludgy matter, as to clog the action of the valve and plunger of the common pump. The principle here employed is the converse of the screw-propeller of the steam-boat; and its construction is a series of those propellers fixed at short intervals on a vertical axis, placed in the interior of an upright pipe. The axis or spindle is put into rather rapid revolution, and the water rises without priming or any other precaution. No valves nor nice fitting of any kind are required. This machine is a fine example of ingenious, simple mechanism. It was invented by Mr M'Dowall, engineer, Johnston, Ayrshire. 2067. To know the size of tank required for any particular case, an allowance of 1000 gallons for every cow is a good criterion on a dairy-farm, and that number of gallons occupy 162 cubic feet. When enlarged tanks are desired, it is better, because cheaper, to have parallel rows of narrow tanks contiguous to each other, than to extend the breadth or length, and increase the depth of the dimensions given above (2064.) In a series of parallel tanks, the common walls support the arches on both sides. 2068. A tank of 72 feet in length, 6 feet wide inside, and 6 feet deep below the soles of the drains, contains about 2600 cubic feet, and, with a pump and the carriage of materials, would cost about £24. 66 2069. Mr James Kininmonth, Inverteil, near Kirkcaldy, in Fifeshire, from whom these particulars have been obtained, says that, from his experience in the construction of a good tank, he considers that economy, if not directed by judicious views for the attainment of efficacy in the object, will be attended with loss and disappointment; and, from his experience also of the valuable benefits of liquid manure, he would not only strongly recommend the adoption of the tank upon all farms, but that it should occupy a part in the plan of every new steading. Were such a system generally adopted, much of the expense attending the collection of common manure from towns and villages, and of the purchasing the still more expensive foreign and manufactured manures, now so largely applied, might be saved. It may also be important to add, that the first year's collection of the liquid manure he considered to compensate in full for all the expenses incurred in the construction of the tank."* 2071. A simple and convenient mode of collecting the liquid manure of a dairyfarm-of from 130 to 170 acres, with a stock of cows from 14 to 24, with young beasts and horses-has been practised by Mr McLean, Braidwood, and Mr Wilson, Eastfield, both near Penicuik, Mid-Lothian. Drains are formed from the byres and stables into one main drain, the mouth of which is elevated as high above the ground below it as to admit a liquidmanure barrel-a common butt, mounted on its cart-to stand under it, and receive the liquid direct into the bung-hole; and as the barrel becomes full, it is carted away, and its contents emptied on the field. The barrel contains 150 gallons, and is usually filled three times a-week. When there is an excess of liquid, in consequence of much rain, it is allowed to run into the dunghills below the drain, * Transactions of the Highland and Agricultural Society for March 1846, p. 292-8 2074. The ground along the side of a long tank is the best site for mixing up composts, with the assistance of the liquid manure. Instead of making the composts in the open and level ground, I would form them under cover in a shed, built parallel with the tank, and the floor of which should be as much sunk in the ground as the soles of the liquid-manure drains, in order to allow a free drainage from the shed into the tank. The walls of the shed should be built of stone and lime, as high as 6 feet above the ground, as long as the length of the tank, and 8 or 9 feet in breadth, to make the roof narrow. The floor should be flagged with pavement, having an inclination towards the tank, and numerous openings should pass through the bottom of the wall from the lowest side of the floor, and through the wall of the tank, to serve as conduits for conveying the drainage from the compost-heaps, when they happen to be overcome with an excess of moisture. The roof should be made of durable materials; the back wall next the tank should have perforations just under the eave of the roof, large enough to allow the end of the spout to penetrate them which conveys the liquid from the pump of the tank to different parts of the compost under the shed; and when the compost will take up no more liquid, the liquid will find its way by the small drains on the floor into the tank. The front wall should have an opening 6 feet wide above the ground, through which to fill the shed with compost materials, and afterwards to fill the carts with compost. Here every sort of experiment may be performed in the formation of composts; and, if desired, the shed might be subdivided into compartments, to allow the experiments to be conducted on a smaller scale, and in different stages of fermentation. The ground plan of this compost-shed may be seen at h', Plate II., alongside the tank k'. 2075. The Water-Cart.-The watercart has been very long in use for the conveyance of water, when the supply of that necessary element for household use has been distant from the steading. It is usually the naked bed-frame of a cart mounted on wheels, and surmounted with a cask of a capacity suited to the demands of the establishment. The cask is furnished with a funnel, inserted in or attached immediately over the bung-hole; and it is likewise furnished with a spigot, or with a stop-cock, inserted into that end of the cask which hangs over the back of the cart. When the water-cart has been drawn to the fountain or the pond, from which water is to be conveyed, it is filled either by means of a common pump, raised so high as to deliver the water which it lifts into the funnel of the cask, or the water is lifted with the hand by means of a scoop, having a helve of sufficient length to enable the workman to reach the pond on the one hand, and the funnel on the other. The scoop best adapted to this purpose is a small wooden pitcher, about 8 inches in depth and 10 inches in diameter, the helve passing through its sides in an oblique direction, and a little above its centre of gravity. Liquid manure can be conveyed into a barrel by means of such a scoop as well as water. 2076. The Liquid-Manure Cart.-For the more economical distribution of this * Transactions of the Highland and Agricultural Society for July 1848, p. 266. valuable manure, this machine is now taking its due place amongst the machinery of the farm. As most commonly used, it differs very little from the above, except in its being provided with the distributing apparatus in place of the spigot; but in large establishments the cask is superseded by a covered rectangular cistern or tank, which takes the place of a common cartbody. The watering of public streets and highways has induced the necessity of the rectangular tank for the distribution of water over the surface of roads, because of the ease with which, by this construction, a greater quantity of water can be put upon one pair of wheels. Here the quantity of water to a given surface is much greater than in the case of a liquid manure, and hence the propriety of a capacious tank for the distribution of water on streets, while the same principle (economy in the expense) leads to the propriety of employing a smaller and less expensive vessel for the distribution of liquid manure, which will not in general be superabundant. For a liquid-manure cart, a' cask of 120 or 140 gallons contents, will be found more economical in first cost than a rectangular tank; and as these machines can be only occasionally in operation, they will, if not very carefully attended to, become leaky while standing unoccupied. In this respect the cask will have a manifest advantage over the tank, for the tightening of a cask is an operation the most simple, by the act of driving up the hoops; while, in the case of the tank becoming leaky, no means of that kind can be resorted to, and the alternative is, either soaking it in water till the wood has imbibed as much of the fluid as will expand its substance and close the leaks, or the vessel must be tightened by some more expensive process. As the more economical of the two, therefore, in point of expense, I have chosen the cask-mounted cart for the illustration. Fig. 194 is a representaFig. 194. tion in perspective of this cart, of the simplest and most convenient construction. For the more easy means of filling the cask, it is suspended between the shafts of the cart, and this position requires the bending of the axle to nearly a semicircle. The cart is a mere skeleton, consisting of the shafts a a, which for this purpose may be made of red pine, their length being about 14 feet. They are connected by a fore and hind bar, placed at such distance as will just admit the length of the cask, while the width between the shafts is suited to the diameter of it. The axle, as already noticed, is bent downward to nearly a semicircle, to receive the cask, and its length will of course be greater than the common cart-axle; even the distance between the caddy-bolts, in a straight line, will be usually greater, but this will depend on the diameter of the cask. A pair of common broad cart-wheels bb are fitted to the axle. The cask c is suspended on two straps of hoop-iron, the ends of which are bolted to the shafts, and the same bolts pass also through the ends of two lighter straps which pass over and secure the cask firmly in its place. The funnel or hopper d is usually fixed upon the top of the cask over the bung-hole, or it be inserted therein by means of an may attached pipe. The distributor e may be made of sheet-copper, of cast-iron or malleable iron, or even of wood; the copper will be found the most durable, and it should be at least one-twentieth of an inch in thickness. The next best is the patent malleable iron tube: cast-iron, though sometimes used, is not to be recommended, neither is wood desirable, from its liability to choke. The bore of the distributor should be not less than 2 inches, nor is it required to exceed 24 inches, the length from 7 to 7 feet, and slightly bent with a uniform curvature, which last property causes it to cover a wider surface of ground than it would do if straight. But, in giving the distributor its curvature, care must be taken to avoid increasing the curvature towards the ends, as is sometimes done, to the prevention of uniform distribution of the manure. The ends of the tube must be closed with movable covers, screwed or otherwise fixed, that they may be removed at pleasure, for the purpose of sponging out the tube when it happens to get clogged up with any solid matter. A line of perforations is made along the hinder side of the tube for the discharge of the fluid; these should be at the distance of one inch apart, and their opening about an eighth of an inch diameter. As the area of these discharging orifices cannot be altered at pleasure, nor their amount of discharge altered for any given time, it becomes necessary, in distributing any given quantity per acre, to regulate that quantity by increasing or diminishing the rate of travelling the cart over the ground. The distributor is attached to the cask by means of a stemƒ, of the same materials and bore as the main tube, and it enters the end of the cask close to the lower chime. A stop-cock is frequently put upon the stem f to regulate the discharge-and for this purpose it is very beneficial, serving in a great measure to regulate the quantity per acre, but for the entire setting off or on of the supply, the stem fopens into a small chamber inside the cask, which chamber is closed by a flap-valve heavily loaded. This valve, when closed, stops the discharge, and, when lifted, the fluid has a free passage to the distributor. The opening of the valve is effected by a small chain attached to the flap, rising to the top of the cask at g, where it passes over a small roller, and onward to the fore part of the cart on the nigh side, where it hangs at hand for the carter to set off or on at pleasure. Fig. 195 is a section of part of the cask, and showing the chamber and valve; ƒ is again the stem of the distributor, h a stop-cock, i the chamber, and k the valve, which is the common leather flap or clack valve, Fig. 195. THE APPARATUS FOR REGULATING THE well loaded with lead, c c is part of the cask, l the chain attached to the valve, and passing over the roller m. 2077. When the liquid-manure cart is furnished with a tank, the latter can, with equal facility, be placed low for the convenience of filling; thus the axle may be cranked, as in the Liverpool dray-cart, the tank resting on the cranked part of the axle; or the axle may remain straight, and the tank appended below the axle. Such a tank may be conveniently built to contain a ton of the liquid, or about 220 gallons; and the distributing apparatus is the same as for the cask. The distributor, as now made by Mr Crosskill, and which I saw on a cart exhibited by him at the Show of the Highland and Agricultural Society in August 1848, swings upon a stud; and this is a great improvement on the former construction, inasmuch as the distributor always remains in a level position, whatever may be the inclination of the ground upon which the cart has to pass over, and, therefore, |