ICE-HOUSE. A repository for ice during the summer season. In London and other places, ice is kept by the confectioners in deep cellars, from which the ex ternal air is excluded as much as possible, and provided with drains to keep them dry. When the surrounding soil is moist, a frame-work, or case of carpentry is constructed, having a grating at bottom, and is so placed in the cellar as to be two or more feet distant from the floor, aides, and roof of the cellar. In this the ice is said to be as perfectly preserved as in a dry cellar. Some market-gardeners preserve ice in great heaps, by merely building it upon an elevated base in the open garden, and covering it over and around by a very thick stratum of straw or reeds. This plan of preserving ice is in accordance with Mr. Cobbett's recommendation in his Cottage Economy, wherein he observes that " an ice house should not be underground, nor shaded by trees, but be exposed to the sun and air ;" that its bed should be three feet above the level of the ground, and composed of something that will admit of the drippings flowing instantly off; and he adds, that "with some poles and straw, a Virginian will construct an ice-house for ten dollars, worth a dozen of those which cost the man of taste in England as many scores of pounds." The ice-houses built by the Virginians consist of an inner shed, surrounded by an outer one, and having a sufficient vacant space between the two to enable a person to walk round ; the walls and roofs of both the sheds are made of thatch, laid on about a foot thick; and the ice is deposited in the inner shed on a bed of straw. In England and France, the common form of ice-houses is that of an inverted cone, or rather of an hen's egg, with the broad end uppermost. The situation of an ice-house should be dry, as moisture has a tendency to dissolve the ice ; it should also be so elevated that water may freely run off. It should be exposed to the sun and air (as observed by Mr. Cobbett), not under the drip, or in the shade of trees, in order that the external deposit of moisture may be readily evaporated. The form of the building may be varied according to circumstances; but in the sell or receptacle for the ice, it is desirable to have sufficient room for the deposit of two or three years' consumption, as a provision against mild winters. Where the situation is of a dry, chalky, gravelly, or sandy kind, the pit may be entirely below the surface of the ground ; in which case, an ice-house on the plan recom mended by the late Mr. David Gordon (which was considered by that gentleman as an improvement upon the American and Italian methods) may be advan tageously introduced, of which the annexed sketch represents an elevation.
Die a pit of about 12 feet deep, and wide enough to permit the erec tion therein of a frame of rough wood posts. This frame is to be 14 feet
wide each way at the bottom, and 16 feet each way at the top, conformably to the sketch. The posts may be about 9 inches in diameter, placed near enough to each other for thin laths to be nailed upon them, and the inside be dressed to an acute angle, so that as little wood as possible may touch the ice. On the inside let thin laths be nailed at about two feet apart. On the outside, at moderate distances, nail rough boards, and fill the place within with wheat, or rye straw set on end. The inside of the roof to be made in the same way, and also the gables. Straw is to be sewed on the inside, and heath or straw on the outside of the door.
The outside of the roof is to be thickly thatched with straw or heath ; and heath, bnishwood, or fir tops, to be filled in between the outside boarding and the surrounding ground, and then neatly thatched or turfed over. The bottom of the house, for two feet deep, should be laid with large logs or stones, next with heath, fir-tops, or brushwood, and then with straw. The ice-house thus completed, will look like a square bee-hive inverted, and is then ready to receive the ice or snow. But unless the house be in a very shady place, Gordon observes, it may be necessary to extend the roof, where the door is placed, five or six feet, making a second gable and door, finished in the same way as the first, and fill up the intervening space, except a passage, with heath or straw.
Mode offilling the house.—When the ice (or snow, if ice cannot be procured,) is put into the house, it must be well beaten down with a pavior's rammer, or mallet, and the surface ahougs kept concave, as by this means any snow or ice that may melt will run to the middle, or interstices, and freeze. For the same reason, the ice ought always to be kept concave when it is taken out for tree. Should the frost be very intense when the ice-house is getting filled, it may be very beneficial at the close of each day's filling to throw in thirty or forty pails of water, which will fill the interstices and freeze. When the house is full, spread upon the concave surface a carpet, or sail split up the middle, and upon the top thereof a foot thick of water. When ice is required fly the use of the family, or when it is necessary to put in fresh meat to lie on the face of the ice for preservation, or to take out for use, the straw and carpet, or sail, is to be opened in the middle. Should rata infest the place, an iron-wire frame or case may be required to put the meat or fish, &c. into when lying on the ice. A small open surface-drain ought to be dug round the house, to prevent any water running into it. Opening the door of the house does little harm. Damp or dense substances touching the ice is much more prejudicial than dry air.