color, and are then ready to spread on the drying shelves; but if there is a large number together, and the heat has been well kept in, they may be left for another twenty-four hours. A curing house for preparing a crop up to 2,000 pounds (dry) may have the following dimensions and fixings: 30 feet long, 15 feet broad, 13 feet in height of walls. It should be divided into four compartments, two on the ground and two above, each being approximately 15 by 15 and 6¹⁄₂ feet high. One compartment on the ground floor is used as a hot room, having a flue 2 feet wide covered with sheet iron running through the center. If the heat is too intense from this, sand may be sprinkled on top to reduce it. Above this flue and around two sides of the hot chamber tiers of shelves are fixed 6 inches apart, on which the pods are spread to dry. The shelves may be conveniently made of laths, on top of which mats or canvas can be laid; or fine-meshed wire netting would serve the same purpose, perhaps, better than anything else. The entire arrangement will be more easily understood by reference to fig. 2. Compartment No. 1 is the hot room. Dotted lines in it and in Nos. 3 and 4 indicate where shelves are fixed; D, door; W, window, etc. The table is used for sorting green pods on, and is otherwise useful at final measuring time and when the pods are tied into packets. No. 3 is above No. 1, and is also a warm room, some heat from No. 1 coming up through the floor. The clear spaces in Nos. 2 and 4 have fiber mats spread on them when required, and on these the pods are handled and sorted as they progress in curing. The worker, sitting on the floor, keeps the four lots of pods--long, medium, short, and split--distinct on the shelves. This facilitates the sorting, the short and split pods needing to be examined sooner and oftener than the longer and sound sorts, as they dry more rapidly. A good average heat for the hot chamber is 110° F. A few degrees more or less does not matter, but pods are apt to dry too quickly if the heat is much greater. The slower the process the more uniform and better is the result. As they begin to turn soft and show longitudinal wrinkles the pods are removed from room 1 to 3, and after reaching a certain degree of flexibility they pass on to the shelves in room 4 and there finish their curing. If kept too long in either a hot or a warm room the thin ends of pods shrink too quickly, and this is to be avoided. In a large crop there are always some inferior, ill-nourished pods, in which this occurs, but the last remark will be useful to a beginner. When fully cured the pods are much wrinkled and pliable, bending easily around one’s finger. There is considerable difference in the degree of dryness preferred by different curers. If the contents move easily all along a pod, without any unevenness being noticed when it is drawn between the finger and thumb, it is nearly dry enough; but the right stage can only be learned by experience.