Rural Hygiene. Henry N. Ogden
for the cows as the house is for the owner, subject to no fluctuations of temperature, and that, in this way, the health as well as the comfort and milk production of the cows would be maintained.
Light should be listed as the first essential of healthy stables, light to kill disease-producing bacteria, to make dirty corners and holes impossible, and to react on the vitality of the animals. Compare this with some stables where fifteen, twenty, or thirty head are stabled in an underground dugout with two or three small windows not giving more than four square feet in all. Stable windows should be set, like house windows, in two sashes and capable of being raised or lowered at will. In winter a large sash may be screwed over the regular window to keep out frost and moisture, provided there is some independent method of ventilation.
For good healthy conditions, a cow needs about 500 cubic feet of space, with active ventilation. In old stables, with poor construction, as little as 200 cubic feet per cow was allowed, and when stables were made tight with matched boards and building paper, 200 cubic feet was found to be too small, and it was recommended that one cubic foot be allowed for each pound of cow. But when tried by wealthy amateurs, it was found that this was too large; the stables were damp and cold in winter and became a predisposing factor in the development of tuberculosis. Between the two extremes, 200 and 1000, is the practical average named above, namely, 500 cubic feet of air space for each cow.
For the health of the cow as well as for the good quality of the milk the stable should be built with special reference to being kept clean. The ceiling should be dust-tight, so that if hay is stored above, it will not sift through. The part of the barn where the cows are kept should be separated from the rest of the barn by tight partitions and a door into the cow stable. Nothing dusty or dirty should accumulate. The floor of all stables for cows, horses, hens, and pigs should be of concrete to insure the most sanitary construction. Planks absorb liquids and wear out rapidly under the feet of the stock. Concrete can be kept clean, is nonabsorptive, and if covered with some non-conducting material, like sawdust, shavings, or straw, is a perfectly comfortable floor for the animals.
Use of concrete.
No development of recent times has tended more toward the improvement and greater comfort of house building than the use of concrete. In the earlier houses, the cellar walls were so badly built and the connection between the top of the cellar wall and the timber sill of the house was so poor that the winter's wind blew through above to the manifest discomfort of those in the house. The writer remembers sitting in the best room of a well-to-do farmer, and watching, with great interest, the carpet rise and fall with the gusts of wind outside. To avoid such unhappy consequences, farmers have been accustomed to bank up the house outdoors in the fall with dry leaves, spruce-boughs, or manure, usually to a point on the woodwork. This, of course, closes the cellar windows for the winter for the sake of keeping out the wind. A concrete wall, at the present price of cement, using gravel for the mixture instead of stone, need cost but little more than the price of the cement and the labor involved, and a tight cellar wall may thereby be obtained.
If the soil in which the cellar is dug is firm enough, the outside of the excavation can be made so that no form on that side will be required, but it is always better to make the excavation about two feet more than necessary, to put forms inside and outside, and, after their removal, plaster or wash the wall with a thick cream of cement and water. In carrying the wall above the ground, forms must be used with great care to secure a smooth surface, and Fig. 13 shows two methods suggested by the Atlas Cement Company.
There are so many forms of construction where concrete is not merely a convenience but a great advantage in the matter of health around the house, and particularly a house in the country, that there would be no end if one once began enumerating and describing the various methods and processes involved. Besides the cellar walls and cellar floor, there are outside the house, silos, manure bins, walks, curbing, steps, horse-blocks, hitching and other posts, watering troughs, and drainpipe, all successfully made of this useful material. In the barn, the barn floor, the gutters, the manger and watering troughs, cooling tanks, and sinks are also made of cement. While it is possible to differentiate between the methods and the mixtures for these various purposes, it will not be greatly in error if the construction always follows the following principle.
Use enough cement to fill the voids in the gravel or in the sand and stone mixture employed, and have enough sand in the gravel or with the stone to fill the voids in the stone. This is readily determined, as already suggested, by the use of water. The water, which will occupy the voids in the stone, represents the necessary sand. When this amount of sand and stone is well mixed, the water then permeating the interstices represents the necessary cement, though it is a good plan to add about 10 per cent extra to allow for imperfect mixtures.
The mixing should always be done so thoroughly that when put together dry, no variation can be seen in the color of the mixture. It is surprising to see how readily a streak of unmixed dirt or of unmixed cement can be detected in a pile by the difference in the color which it presents. Such mixtures should always be made dry first and then the water added and again mixed until the result is of a perfectly firm consistency. Such a mixture can be applied to any of the purposes mentioned, and, in general, it is better to have too much water than not enough. The only difficulty with a very wet mixture is that the forms require to be made nearly water-tight, whereas with dry mixtures the same attention to the forms is not necessary.
If the concrete is to be used in thin layers, as in pipe or watering trough, where a smooth surface is wanted, better results are usually obtained by using a dry mixture and fine gravel and tamping the mixture with unusual thoroughness. It is always unsafe to smooth up or re-surface a piece of concrete. The difference in texture of the surface coat causes it to expand and contract differently from the mass of concrete underneath, and inevitably a separation occurs. If it is desired to put on a sidewalk, for instance, a smooth top coat, the consistency of the two kinds of concrete should be alike, and the top coat should be applied almost immediately after the bottom layer is put in place. Where concrete is used to hold water, a coat of neat cement should always be put on with a broom or a whitewash brush, mixing the neat cement with water in a pail, and it does no harm to go over the surface three or four times, the object being to thoroughly close the pores in the concrete.
For floors of cellars or barns, the dirt should be evened off and tamped and then the cement concrete should be spread evenly over it, and tamped just enough to bring the water to the surface. When partially dry, a better finish is obtained by lightly troweling the concrete. In a cellar or barn, it is not necessary to divide up the area into squares or blocks as is done with sidewalk work, but the entire area may be laid in one piece. In order to keep the surface level, however, it may be found convenient to lay down pieces of 2" x 4" scantling, the tops of which shall be on the desired level of the finished floor. By filling in behind these scantlings, which can be moved ahead as the filling progresses, the exact level desired can be obtained. Usually four inches thick will be a proper depth of concrete for this purpose.
CHAPTER IV
VENTILATION
The average individual breathes in and out about eighteen times a minute, taking into his lungs the air surrounding him at the time and expelling air so modified as to contain large amounts of carbonic acid, organic vapor, and other waste products of the lungs. The volume of air taken in is about the same quantity as that expelled and amounts to eighteen cubic feet per hour. Fortunately, the air expired at a breath is at once rapidly diffused throughout the surrounding atmosphere, so that, even if no fresh air were introduced, the second breath inhaled would not be very different from the first. But after a certain length of time the air becomes so saturated with the waste products