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building. The glass is double thick, first quality French sheet, that on the body of the roof being twenty inches wide, giving a very light but at the same time, it is believed, a very substantial covering for the plants.

The walls are of brick, eleven inches thick, containing an air space of three inches. To this wall the wood work of the structure is securely bolted. The lower sashes, between the roof and the brick wall, have eighteen by twenty-four inch glass, and are fixed, there being no bottom ventilation.

The south end of the building has two glass doors, through which two small railroad tracks pass, on which run four tables on wheels. These tables are for the experimental plants in jars, and are designed to allow of the plants being run out of the house into the open air and being pushed back under shelter at night, or in storms of wind or rain.

The plant-house is twenty-six feet long by fifteen and a half feet inside; and is so arranged that, if desirable in summer, the track can be lowered and the plants run out in a trench well grassed on either side, and kept watered to reduce the temperature. During the winter the plant-house is heated by hot water flowing through four-inch iron pipes, as is ordinarily done in greenhouses. The apparatus was made by Hitchings & Co., of New York.

They also made the ventilating apparatus, which enables one or all of the sashes on one or both sides, as we may wish, to be raised by simply turning a crank placed beside the door.

The dwelling is situated only a few feet distant from the work-rooms, and a little back so as not to shade the plant-house. It was our object in planning the cottage to have a neat, compact and attractive house, which any well-to-do farmer might imitate, and large enough for a moderate-sized family.

The general arrangement of the rooms can be seen in the plan. The house is a two-story structure, with kitchen extension, the sides shingled down as far as the top of the second-story windows. The roof was painted with a metallic paint mixed in cotton-seed oil, which gave a very cheap, and, so far as we can see, durable paint for outside work.

The inside wood work was finished off in imitation of cherry, being stained and varnished with two coats. This makes the house brighter and seems more attractive than paint. The walls, instead of being whitewashed, had two coats of alabastine, in several tints.

The stable is not yet completed, but it is believed it will be compact, and conveniently arranged for an average-sized farm. The building is so arranged that three or four more stalls can be put in on the main floor, or cow stalls, or sheep or hog-pens could be put underneath, as indeed we purpose doing later. Also, if it is wished, the building could be made longer, and more room be made for stalls in this way, while a tool-room, storeroom or large carriage-room, or all combined, could be added on the side opposite the shed. The subject of plans for conveniently arranged barns and stables for our farmers is one which frequently comes up. We will have a good-sized, airy loft, with a tight floor to keep the dust from falling on the stock, and will keep our hay and fodder up-stairs, loading in through a door in front over the main entrance door, and will have a shoot to deliver the stuff down-stairs into the stable. The grain will be kept in bins, which will be placed up-stairs, if necessary, with shoots leading down into the stable. Other details can be seen from the plan. The building being on a hill-side, renders it easy to have a good, roomy basement, with large doors at the rear, into which wagons can be backed for manure, fertilizers, composts, &c.

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STABLE AT FARM OF N. C. AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION.

FIELD EXPERIMENTS.

ON PASTURE AND HAY GRASSES.

It was not to be expected that, with land in the condition in which the Farm was on the first of April, we should have many valuable results of general interest from our experiments in the field the first year. It will be at least a year yet before we get the land in good shape for the work expected of us. We have, however, made a beginning, and put down what land was ready in some permanent experiments to extend over a series of years. One portion, as has been mentioned, has been put down in some of our principal grasses, where they can be seen by visitors growing side by side, where we can compare their habits of growth, their yield per acre, their adaptability to this climate and soil, and pound for pound their feeding value. Rather more than an acre of land was laid off on part of the land of the Agricultural Society in one-twentieth acre plots, and put down in permanent pasture under different methods of preparing the land, and different fertilizers and manures. In arranging for this permanent pasture, a mixture of grasses was selected which ripens at different times, giving grazing from early spring to fall. The grasses all seem to grow better when several are grown on the same land than when they are grown singly. It would be an easy matter for any farmer to put down half an acre, or a quarter of an acre, near their house or barn, in a permanent pasture of this kind to let his young stock run on. Just let them try it, and if they have young stock, or a cow, and have only a quarter of an acre in pasture, the first year they will surely be so pleased that they will increase the area another year, and consider the expense as small compared with the results. Suppose several should send for seed and divide it among them, giving each just enough for a small plot. Let each select a spot of the

best land accessible and apply ground bone at the rate of three hundred, four hundred, five hundred, or better, one thousand pounds per acre, and two hundred or three hundred pounds of kainite; or, instead of these, a good dressing of stable manure or yard scrapings, or even the scrapings of a compost heap, or wood ashes from the house. Let him make a beginning, however small. It will probably be large enough to keep a calf on, or perhaps a cow part of the time, and he will be pretty sure to increase the area. The kind of grasses and the amount of seed per acre is relatively unimportant. It should depend upon the uses, whether for hay (when those should be selected which ripen together), or for pasture and grazing (those grasses which ripen at different times), upon the soil, climate, situation, &c. But you will not go far wrong if red clover is one, or orchard grass, tall meadow oat grass, red top, Italian rye grass, meadow fescue, Kentucky blue grass (in pasture), or a little sweet vernal in a hay mixture, to give a pleasant odor to the hay, are in your mixtures. Any or all of these could be used to good advantage, if properly cared for. The first three ripen nearly together, and make an excellent hay mixture. The proportion of seed of each to sow is of comparatively little importance, except in the matter of first cost, as the grasses will finally adjust themselves. It is better, however, to give a good heavy seeding with all, after thorough preparation of the land. Our own mixture, with the quantities used per acre, is as follows:

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