Page:An Encyclopædia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture and Furniture.djvu/650

 C/2C) COTTAGE, FARM, AND VILLA ARCHITECTURE. 1197 61 JJ ^ ct communicated to the floor of the poultry-house. In all cases, the walls of this poultry place should be of sufficient thickness to retain heat, and more particularly the root, which should have the space between the ceiling and the slates or tiles filled in with hay or straw, as in Holland. The walls and doors may also, in very severe weather, be covered with straw mats of the kind used by gardeners in covering hot-beds ; or the entire lean-to, roof and sides, may be thatched. When the fireplace of the living-ioom is against an interior wall, there are three ways in which heat may be derived from it for warming a poultry place. That the most readily practised, we believe, will be, to form a small lean-to, on the south or south-east side of the house, with a hol- low floor, having a stone or plate of iron to lift up, and admit of placing hot ashes or embers beneath it. If the Iiovel be properly constructed for retaining heat, as just recommended, and hot embers be put under the floor once a day, it will be suf- ficient to keep up a temperature of from fifty degrees to sixty degrees, in even the most severe weather. It must be recollected, however, that we suppose, in this case, either double doors and windows, or external coverings to them of straw. A second mode is, to communicate heat to a cistern of water, or a bed of stones, under the floor of the poultry hovel, by pipes passing through the kitchen fire ; but this, though an extremely simple inode, and by no means expensive, is yet so much out of the common way, that the farm labourer could hardly be expected, in his present state, to consent to its adoption. We shall, however, show with what ease it might be accomplished. Fig. 1197 is the plan of a cottage, in which it is desired to heat the poultry-house, a, from the fireplace, b. Care being taken to form the floor of the poultry-house not much lower than that of the room containing the fireplace, place in the former a stone or wooden cistern, a foot or more in depth, and of any convenient length and breadth. A poultry-house containing 10,000 cubic feet of air need not have a cistern containing above 100 cubic feet of water. Let either the bottom or the top of the cistern be placed on a level with the bottom of the fireplace. Then, supposing the former, which is preferable, to be the case, take a small iron pipe, rather more than twice the length of the distance between the cistern and the kitchen fireplace 1 1 no / (that used as gas-pipe, about an incli in '^ diameter externally, and which may be had for about 4d. per foot, is the best), and bend it in the middle, so that the bent end may lie in the bottom of the fireplace, and - — the open ends in the bottom of the cistern in the poultry-place, as shown in the section fig. 1 1 98, in which c is the fireplace ; d, the two pipes ; and e, their ends in the cistern. The end of one wf these pipes is shown turned up one inch, and the other several inches, to promote the circulation by destroying the equilibrium which necessarily exists when die orifices of both tubes are on the same level. If, instead of the bottom of the cistern being on a level with the bottom of tlie fireplace, its top is on that level, then it is only necessary to reverse the pipes, as shown in fig. 1199, taking care that they are first filled with water, when the circulation will take place on the siphon principle ; and be effective in heating the air of the poultry- house, either directly by radiation, or through the medium of a coat of stones or gravel, as may be considered best. The cistern, or receptacle for water, may be an old iron pot or kettle, or a large jar. A body of water will very soon be heated by either of these methods ; and that body may be surrounded by a mass of stones or gravel, which will thus accumulate a quantity of heat, to be given out by degrees, according to the tem- perature of the poiUtry-liouse. Where gas pipe cannot be got, even lead pipe will answer for a short time ; because it will not melt, while there is a circulation of water at a lower temperature than 200° going on within it. An excellent de- scription of apparatus for being placed in the fire might be made of cast iron, or of terro-metallic earth ; and, at the distance of a foot from the fireplace, a lead or wooden pipe might be joined to it, either of which would answer as well for circulating the water as pipes made of any u r^ u