tside as for a common barn. The boards
must be well seasoned, and all cracks or holes should be plastered
or otherwise stopped up. Make a shed-roof of common boards. In the
inside put upright standards about five feet apart, with
cross-pieces to support the scaffolding. The first cross-pieces to
be four feet from the floor; the next two feet higher, and so on to
the top. On these cross-pieces lay small poles, about six feet long
and two inches thick, four or fire inches apart. On these scaffolds
the madder is to be spread nine inches thick. A floor is laid at the
bottom to keep all dry and clean. When the kiln is filled, take six
or eight small kettles or hand-furnaces, and place them four or five
feet apart on the floor (first securing it from fire with bricks or
stones), and make fires in them with charcoal, being careful not to
make any of the fires so large as to scorch the madder over them. A
person must be in constant attendance to watch and replenish the
fires. The heat will ascend through the whole, and in ten or twelve
hours it will all be sufficiently dried, which is known by its
becoming brittle like pipe stems.

_Breaking and grinding._--Immediately after being dried, the madder
must be taken to the barn and threshed with flails, or broken by
machinery (a mill might easily be constructed for this purpose), so
that it will feed in a common grist-mill. If it is not broken and
ground immediately, it will gather dampness so as to prevent its
grinding freely. Any common grist-mill can grind madder properly.
When ground finely it is fit for use, and may be packed in barrels
like flour for market.

_Amount and value of product, &c._--Mr. Swift measured off a part of
his ground, and carefully weighed the product when dried, which he
found to be over two thousand pounds per acre, notwithstanding the
seasons were mostly dry and unfavorable. With his present knowledge
of the business, he is confident that he can obtain at least three
thousand pounds per acre, which is said to be more than is often
obtained in Germany. The whole amount of labor he estimates at from
eighty to one hundred days' work per acre. The value of the crop, at
the usual wholesale price (about fifteen cents per pound), from
three to four hundred dollars. In foreign countries it is customary
to make several