Morton's Hand Books of the Fam.

m mi.

The Dairy

BY

James Long and I C. MoRiorc.

VINTON & CO^ Ltd^ 9, New Bridge Street,

LONDON.

PERKINS
AGRICULTURAL LIBRARY

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE
SOUTHAMPTON

MOETON'S
HANDBOOK OF THE FAEM SEEIES.

Prepared undo- the direction of the late
J. CHALMEKS MOBTON,

EDITOR OF THE "AGBICULTHHAIi CVOLOP.EDIA ; " TDK "AGBICDLTITKAL GAZBTTB;
THE " FAKMBR'S CALENDAR ; " THE " FARMER'S ALMANAC ; "
" HANDBOOK OF THE DAIRY ; " " FARM LABOUBEK," ETC.

Morton's Handbooks of the Farm.

Edited by James S:kolaib, Editor of Agricultural Gazette, Live Stocli Journal, etc.

No. VII.

THE DAIRY.

BT

JAMES LONG AND J. C. MORTON.

THIRD EDITION.

Revised and hrouglit up to date.

LONDON:

TINTON & CO., Ltd., 9, NEW BRIDGE STREET, E.G.

1892.

The present Volume is one of a series discussing the Cultiva-
tion of the Farm, its Live Stock, and its Cultivated Plants, the
Farm and the Estate Equipment, the Chemistry of Agriculture,
and the Processes of Animal and Vegetable Life. Among the
writers who have been engaged on them are Messrs. T. Bowick,
the late W. Bueness, G. Murray, the late W. T. Careington,
the Eev. G. Gilbert, Messrs, J. Hill, E. Henry Eew,
James Long, Sanders Spencer, and the late J. C. Morton,.
Professors G. T. Brown, J. Buckman, J. Woetley-Axe, and
J. Scott, Dr. M. T. Masters, F.B.S., and Mr. K. Warington,
F.C.S.

PEETACE TO FIRST EDITION.

Theeb is no branch of English Agriculture
which has more profited by the spirit of investi-
gation and the practice of recording observations
which have of late more or less possessed us alL
To Mr. H. M. Jenkins, of the Eoyal Agricultural
Society, we are indebted for a knowledge of French
and Danish Dairying, which has done a great deal
during the past ten years to improve our own dairy
practice. And to the rivalry and records of breeds
and of individual animals on the other side of the
Atlantic we owe a knowledge of the possibilities of
milk and butter produce of which no idea formerly
existed. It is not too much to say that the
traveller and the enthusiast, the inventor and the
chemist, have together of late years lifted what
used to be the homeHest and most stagnant of all
departments of our Agriculture into the very fore-
most rank of all, so far as energy, activity, and all
the other evidences of life are concerned. In the
following pages, accordingly, along with the sub-
stance of a former handbook* published many years

• " Handbook of Dairy Husbandi-y," by J. Cbalmers Morton.
Lonjjmans. 1860.

vi

PEEPACE.

ago for the present writer, there will be found not
only those pages brought clown to the present date
and re-wntten and condensed, but much added
information on Foreign Dairying, contributed by
Mr. James Long, and a tolerably full account of
the improved practice and experience in our own
Dairy districts at home.

J. c. M.

PEEFACE TO THIED EDITION.
— ♦ —

Since the appearance of the last Edition of
^is work, a good friend of British Agriculture,
Mr. J. C. Morton, who was responsible for the
bulk of the letterpress, has gone to his rest.
A new Edition has been called for, and the
great advances and changes— for there have been
both— which have taken place in connection with
the Dairy Industry, necessitated a corresponding
revision of these pages, many of which have been
re-written. The book has simply been brought
up to date, without disturbing the design of its
original author.

October, 1892.

J. L.

CONTENTS.

INTEODUCTION . . . .

CHAP.

I. — Daiey Statistics . . .
II. — Food of the Cow . . '
III, — Choice and Teeatjient of the Cow
lY. — Milk . . . . .
V. — Butter ....
VI. — Cheese , . , . .

VII. — GrENEEAL MANAGEMENT . .
VIII. — POBEIQN DaIETING

INDEX

THE DAIEY OF THE FARM.

INTKODUCTION.

A BOOK on Dairy Husbandry ought to describe the
management of the farm so far as that is directed to tie
production of milk, as well as the processes of the dairy
through the medium of which milk is made to yield
its various marketable products.

The present Handbook is, however, one of a series ;
and some of the topics usually included in an extended
review of dairy farming have been discussed else-
where. The particular management, both of breeding
stock and of the crops cultivated for their food, has
already been described. In the Handbook of the Live-
stock of the Farm, also, there are chapters on dairy
and other breeds of cattle, and short instructions are
given not only on the duties of the herdsman, but on
those of the dairyman also; and the reader will find,
in a condensed form, some of the information which is
more fully given here. Although, therefore, it is in-
tended in the present Handbook to give shortly the
answers of experience to such questions as — What
crops should be grown ? what cattle should be kept ?
how should they be managed, in order that the largest

THE DAIRY OP THE FARM.

quantity and best quality of milk may be produced ?—
yet our chief purpose is to supply in full the information
which the dairyman rather than the farmer needs, and
in chapters on dairy statistics, on the food and choice
and treatment of the cow, on milk, butter, cheese, and
general management, and on foreign dairying, to des-
cribe the experiences of the dairy farmer, and the manu-
facture of butter and cheese, as carried on in foreign
countries and in our best dairy districts.

CHAPTEK I.

DAIRY STATISTICS.

Dairy Produo^-Milk-Butter-Cheeso-Stock and Produce per Acre
—Stock and Produce of the Country.

The butter made from a given quantity of milk, the
produce of ordinary herds of cattle, is rarely more than
4 per cent., varying from one-thirtieth to one-twentieth
of its weight. The cheese made from a given quantity
of milk is^enerally about one-tenth part of its weight
The quantity of butter and of cheese which milk will
yield depends upon the breed of the cow and its in-
dividual character; upon the number of weeks or
months during which it has been in milk; and upon the
food which it receives. All these particulars are included
in the general management of the dairy farm. But it
also depends upon the system of management adopted
in the dairy and upon temperature and skill m manipu-
lating the milk, cream, and curd. Add to the influence
of all these circumstances affecting the quahty of dairy
produce, the fact that the quantity of milk which a
given acreage of land will yield varies enormously with
its quality and the way in which it is cropped and
stocked, and it will be easily understood how the
widest diversity of experience and opinion m dairy
management comes to prevail.

THE DAIEY OF THE PAEM.

It may be observed here, although the chemistry of
the subject has been elsewhere discussed, that the
quantity of butter and of cheese respectively which milk
yields to the dairyman, differs materially from the
quantity which it yields on examination by the chemist
The casein, or strictly cheesy part of milk, does not
generally exceed 4 per cent, of its weight; but the full
milk cheese of the dairy contains much besides the mere
casein of the laboratory; generally speaking, less than
one-third is casein; about one-third is butter; often
more than one-third, when purchased by the factor, is
water, and 3J to 4^ per cent, of its weight is salt and
other mmeral matter. A small percentage of sugar is
also present. It may well be then that milk containing
4 per cent, of casein should yield 10 per cent of
marketable cheese, or even more if the butter per-
centage IS high. And so with the butter of the market •
It differs considerably from the butter of the laboratory'
containing, m addition to the pure fatty matters of which
alone the chemist takes accoimt, half to one per cent of
casein and 12 to 15 per cent, of water, besides a minute
quantity of mineral matter and sugar. And if these
additions do not increase the butter made in the dairy
beyond that which is extracted in the laboratory it is
because so much is lost by the imperfect means of mani-
pulating the milk which are adopted.

The object of the dairy farmer being to derive the
largest possible profit from his land, he crops the araMe
portion and manages the grass in order to keep a full
stock of dairy cows; these he selects of the best class
and frojn the best breeds for the produce of milk for
sale, butter or cheese, according to his purpose. Having

DAIRY STATISTICS.

thus insured the largest produce of the l^^li^y
S desired, he regulates his dauy
in order to obtain from it, as cheaply as possib e,
Less he is solely a milk seller, as much of the
finest cheese or butter as it will yield. Successful
tky farmmg thus implies a knowledge of the crops
th 's to k, and the dairy management best adapted
to a profitable yield of milk, butter, or cheese ^id
these are the three divisions under which it is pro-
posed to arrange the details of dairy experience in
the following Jages, this preliminary section being
devoted to a statement of its gross results m a variety
of instances.

The Yield of Mill..-At the Conference of the British
Dairy Farmers' Association, m Yorkshire, 1890, Mr
Christopher Middleton quoted from the milk^register
kept on the Eston Grange Farm of Messrs^ Bolckow,
Vaughan and Co., which the members of Conference
subs^auently inspected. He showed that 20 o the 40
cows gave the extraordinary average of 1,005 gallons
per head, one animal reaching 1,430 gallons; the ration
while upon grass including 3 lbs. of cotton cake and
lib of maiz? and pea-meal. Mr. Middleton himself
owns a herd of Guernseys, several of the cows m which
have exceeded 800, and some 900 gallons ; while naany
of the heifers have given between 600 and 700 gallons
after their first calf. The herd of ^ows (Shorthorns
and Ayrshire crosses) at the Munster Dairy School
jdelded 721 gallons per head during the first 9 • months
of 1886, the winter ration being 28 lbs. mangels, 20 lbs
hay, and 9 lbs. of meal. Mr. Eichard Barter s (Cork)

6

THE DAIBY OP THE FABM.

herd of Shorthorns, Dutch and Ayrshire crosses, with
one Kerry, averaged 731 gallons in 1887, the summer feed
being supplemented by 2 lbs. of undecorticated cotton
cake and 1 lb. of malt coombs, and the winter ration
consisting of 7 lbs. hay, 42 lbs. gorse, 42 lbs. mangels,
7 lbs. grains, 6 lbs. oats and barley, and 2 lbs. bran.
Lord Braybrooke's herd of 20 Jerseys was stated in the
Agricultural Gazette in 1885 to have yielded an average
of 478 gallons each. The Jersey Cattle Society show
that, upon the basis of 133 tests, cows between three
and four years old gave 29 lbs. 4 ozs. per day; between
five and seven years, 81 lbs. ; and between seven and
nine years, 30 lbs. 7 ozs. The average yield of dairy
Shorthorn cows owned by the Duke of Westminster, at
the Grange Farm in 1890, was 714 gallons. A cov/,
Lyddy, owned by Sir John Lawes, Bart., gave 72 lbs.
7 ozs. of milk in one day. An Ayrshire owned by
Mr. Wallace, of Kirklandholm, gave 13,456 lbs. of milk
in 365 days. In America many instances have been
recorded of Dutch cows giving over 1,500 gallons of
milk in a year, and we have personally met with cows
in Holland which have given 40 quarts in a day.
Examples of cows of the dairy Shorthorn and Ayrshire
varieties yielding over a thousand gallons in a year may
be found in numerous herds.

The IsHngton milking trials which the Association
has conducted afford valuable information, in spite of
the fact that it has been obtained from selected cows
of presumably high milking capacity. We give the
average day's yield of milk of the nine years' trials, the
percentage of butter and total soHds, and the average
weight of three of the leading breeds : —

DAIKY STATISTICS.

AUlk Total Solids, Butter Fat, ""'^f^'^'^
'ihB » per cent. per cent. ms.
„ T2-S7 3-71 (9) 1.359

tile, 2;.I7 1.09 .65 (5)1.-0

* About lOi lbs. = 1 gallon.

From these instances it may be safely gathered that
the average yield of well-managed cows vanes frora
450 to 600 gallons of milk a year, accordmg to breea
and size; the smaller breeds, such as the nnproved
Kerry, yielding but little less than the former of these
quanlitL; and the larger, as the dairy Shorthorn
and some good cross-breeds, yieldmg even more than

the latter. ,.,„,. t „j

It will also be understood that, by skilful feeding and
first-rate management, the average yield of a ^i^^ll dairy
breed like the Ayrshire may be raised as high as 600 or
650 gallons annually; and that, by correspondmg treat-
ment of the larger breeds, their yield may be raised as
high as 800 gallons and upwards, as m some ot the
fnLnces quoted. The experience of skilled dairymen
proves, indeed, that these figures may be exceeded , and
Ihere cows are kept solely for the provision of milk,
and replaced by others at a loss of 61 or 71. a-piece so
soon as their yield falls below about six quarts a day,
the annual yield of the large-framed Shorthorn cow may,
by goodfeeding.be kept at nearly 1,000 gallons animalb
on the average number of the herd in stall throughout
the year.

The Yield of Butter.-The percentage of butter ex-
tracted from milk has materially increased since the
introduction of the separator. It is probable that where

^ THE DAIEY OP THE FARM.

IS now V^ ^-^' required where this machine

1 7 "^ ^"^^y ^^^^^ ^^PPl-d with

entll ^'^"-^^^^^g^^ ^^ttle. As the separator is so
entirely supenor to all the old methods of creaming!

mate h. S '/P^'"* ^* "^^^^^^ *o esti^

mate the yield of butter upon any other basis Those
who can afford to igziore a system which will increase

tt^ or 1*'' likely to read

this or any other work on the subject with an econo
mjcai v:ew. Colonel Curtis Hayward, of Quedgeby near
Gloucester, whose cattle are chiefly ShorthornI and
whose accounts are very accurately kept, found that h'
the year endmo- Marob laoi -1 4. \ > ^^"^'^u mai} m

23- fi4 lb« Z 1, . ^l'/891, It took on the average

24- ?4 1b,% ""'^'^ P"^^^^ butter, or

24 /4 lbs from April to September, and 22-55 lbs. f^om
October to March. It should be observed, how ve"
that about one-half of the milk was purchased.

Mr. Penrose Fitzgerald states that the milk of some
300 cows, of which all but about 50 (Kerries) are Shol
horns, IS separated in the Midleton Factory (co Cork
he average quantity required to make a pound of
but er being for the year 28-5 lbs., this figure falW fl

25 lbs. m November, whereas, he adds, if fwe t
2^"^^: would require no more than 23 X in
-December. At the Dunragit Creamery, where con
siderable skill is exercised in the work the oulf;
ranges between 22 lbs. and 33 lbs the r^ilfl ^
produced chiefly by Ayrshire cows ' The ma" er of
the Farnley Butter Factory finds that it requires 28 bs
of purchased milk to produce 1 lb. of butL he year

DAIRY STATISTICS.

through At the Cathedral Dairy, Exeter, the quantity
varies between 22^ lbs. in autumn to 27 lbs. in spring
In 1886 Mr. James Long tested the milk of eight
selected Bucks dairy Shorthorns. The milk separated
in the two days of the test was 669 lbs., and the butter
churned 36 lbs., or 1 lb. per 18-5 lbs. of milk The
tests conducted under the auspices of the Jersey Cattle
Society have eUcited valuable information. So far the
highest yield of butter recorded in one day is 3 lbs. -5 ozs.
by Mr. Brutton's Baron's Progress at six years old. As
she gave 37 lbs. 5 ozs. of milk, the ratio of butter to milk
was as 1 is to irS lbs. ; the separator was used. At the
Winchester trials in 1890, Mr. Callender's Young Dorcas
gave 3 lbs. 2i ozs. from 28 lbs. 4 ozs. of milk or 1 to
8-99, an astounding ratio. The average ratio of milk to
butter of the 133 cows tested is for heifers, 201 lbs.; tor
cows between 4 and 5 years, 19-41 lbs. ; between 6 and
7 years 17-81 lbs., and between 8 and 9 years, 18-64 lbs.
Although some doubt has been cast upon the accuracy
of American tests, there is no question that surprising
results have been achieved by both Dutch and Jersey
cattle in the States. Cows, desce ndants of the late Mr^
Dauncey's bull Eioter, are reported to have yielded
867 lbs to 778 lbs. and 900 lbs. of butter withm the year.
Thirty cows bred similarly to one of these ammals are
said to have averaged 20 lbs. of butter per week ; and
twenty-seven cows, daughters of another bull of the
same family, averaged over 20 lbs. of butter per week.
Jersey cows of other families are recorded as having
yielded 936 lbs. and 945 lbs. of butter in the year, while
a Dutch cow, Parthenia, one of many wonderful butter
makers, is credited with the yield of 548 lbs. of milk,

THE DAIRY OP THE FARM.

■and 35 lbs. 8* ozs. of butter in seven days, upon a ration
of 27 lbs. of ground oats, maize, linseed, and bran
while runnmg upon pasture. '

Yield of Cheese.-The yield of cheese in proportion

' n ent'L "d -stances^of exp "

inents made by the wnter :-Cheddar System, 120 lbs
milk partly Jersey ; curd when vatted, 13i lbs • cheese
when ripe, 11 lbs. 13 oz. 30.5 lbs. new i part y
Jersey, produced 35 lbs. curd and 28| lbs. npe chee e
and 13^ ^'"^ ^-^-^^ 2« -a

fZ' rfhtrs^^^^

April 26 "'24o"'' 'l'^- «eese.

May 15

280 33
240 28

June 21
July 8
Aug. 10
Sept. 2

22
28
27f
22

220 25} 225-

200 24.V 21'

btilton .-120 lbs. June milk, about one-quarter Jersey
produced 20 lbs. curd and 11 lbs. blue cheese 288 S'
of similar milk m August produced 52 lbs. of curd and
271 lbs. ripe cheese. Mr. David Byrd, of TarporW a
justly Wus Cheshire cheese-maker, sold 24Tn T^d
9 lbs of cheese or 4 rwf 9Qi iKc '
a-P of 114 . 0 - 1''''' ''o^' on *he aver-

age of 114 cows, m 1884, besides 1,372 lbs of butter
whey valued at £1 per cow, and 6,843i gallons of m Ik
This would probably represent over 600 gallons perTow

<:alves, 64 of which were sold and 40 reared. Cheshire

DAIKT STATISTICS.

1 Vv farmers sometimes reach 4^ cwt. (of 121 lbs.) per
dairy . 5 cwt., but this extra yield

j:;:fair^^^^^^^^ expens'e of tbe sale of mill,

ia Ay Se t is a custom for tbe ' ' bower or dairyman
in Ayrsmic farmer 480 lbs. of cheese

«„tmg the aa.ry to pay ^^^^^^^^^

bIC Ajri - such .s the pto adopted
the il- firm of the champion eheese-maker.
Mr. Frederick, of Drumfiower.

S.«ci ..a P.«a.c= pe. Ac.e.-On 'his p jt.fo». or

"der thH^X n srotod. Mr. SrcdericU keeps
Sr^hSesc^ve.-;-^^^^^^^^^
3„„ f -he" r?»?»lves, on 100 ..re,
rlwenSSo carries a fe, -^-^ *«P -

Sytibs!::f:i;aiif^^^^^^^^^

^2 THE DAIBY OF THE FARM.

the enrichment of the manure by the liberal use of

:f2TkT- ™ oast

ot Mr. E Hothersall, of Lightfoot Farm, near Preston
who won the first prize in his class for the bestir;
farm when the Eoyal Agricultural Society's meeting
was at Preston in 1885. This gentlemL kept "!
to 52 large Shorthorns upon 97 acres of grass but
his purchases of food-grains, cake, braT meal
roots, etc.-amounted in value to ±'651 although tit
;rit;r'^' food for several horses, some pi^

Mr. Fearnall, of Eoyton, one of three brothers all
first-rate da.ry farmers, keeps 100 cows, besid^ tarin '
SO heifers annually and fattening 150 pigs and r>nvl-Z
upon 842 acres, of which 55 acres are aSI e ^.1885'
When Mr. Fearnall competed for the Eoyal Fait priz '

costmg £365, and home-grown food to the amount of
10 tons of bariey, 20 tons of oats, and 10 tons of bel

^ tfarmin^r E"' f ° ^^^^"^

best tarm m the Eoyal competition, kept 67 cows 16 two

year-olds, 27 calves, and 2 bulls upon 166 acrer f wllct

82 acres were arable; the sales of milk, cheese, bu ter

and Fgs averagmg £22 12s. lOd. per cow over 64 cow in

addition to which calves sold realised £97 10s h; "

±132 was expended for manures and £530 for foods or

about £4 per acre. The Channel Islands afford numer!

ous mstances of the heavy stocking of land. Mr P Le

Mesurier, of St. Peter's, keeps 45 cows and heifers

the aid of heavy forage cropping. Lucerne and rye

DAIRY STATISTICS.

<^ass enabled Mr. Ozanne to keep 2 bulls. 3 cows, and

^^\t^:XVtW:;n.sandWs,and.^^^
of ^iX character, we have seen for ourselves, and we
1 therefore the better able to point out that lae
shown are only attained by the exercise of the highest
skill and the most energetic management.

These examples are, however -stances rat W^^^^^^^
average than of possible ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
\v\\\ keep a cow for at most eveiy "
; L and under good management, with sorae arable
Ld in addition, a smaller extent will suffice The
oWt of a book on the subject should be rather o
^isent the maxima of agricultural experience and
Tus stimulate progx'ess, than to dwell merely on
Ivlges thought knowledge of t^^ese is ^
truthfi^ statement of ordmary dairy statistics.

Stock and Produce of the Country.-In this para-
gx-aph we give such figures as the annual agricultura
SaTistics of the com.try provide, ^f^l^^'J
the growing extent of the share of the pastoral
^azit and dairying interest in the agriculture of
Great Britain, that the area in permanent pasture has
fncTeas^ed nea;iy one-fourth during the past twei^ty^^^^^^^^
vears It was 12,735,897 acres m extent m 1869 , it was
Te Ss 8 0 acres in 1891. Three and a half miUions of
acres have been laid down with permanent grasses
di ng this period. The number of cattle has a so
incrersed, and almost in the --^P^P^f
were 5,313,473 cattle of all ages m 1869, ^f^^'^H
were 6,852,821 of all ages in 1891. Of these. 2,657,054

THE DAIET OF THE PAEM.

eluding Ireland, war 22 8i? 9«?' '
pasture in 1869;::f # ff, ent
9,078,282 cattle in 1869 and 11 ^^^1 ;

4,117,707 were cows and w

With all deductioz^for thn T ^^^^ "^^'^ ^^i^-
more than rear the r cal and 5'"^ '^'''^
the whole milk is devoted to V '"'^''^
the fatting of veal and ' ^ ' '^^'"'^ °^ «*oek and
the smaU yield of some TZ""^' °" ^^^^ one hand,
large quantity p/odrd bvl T
the yield of milk ''^ ^^^^ ^d especially for

cows'yield ne" fy' 7 8"oTo 000"^,*'^*
this at least on^^fiftf s Zen f " T"^"^"
the consumption of mSv whll "^"^
increased of late years hettt ' ""''^ ^^^^"^^

a-piece daily for each ont of ^ of a pint

gallons th/s co « Ltt

950,000,000 gallons fm'L . ^^educted, leaving
butter, a l^Zy' ^T't:^^^^^^^^^
303,000,000 lbs of pW . Production of

butter-a qu^/tb Srwould '''f ''''''
of cheese aL 5-6 Ibrofbr '
Populatzon per ^^'J:^^:^!:^^^^^

exported. That this i; notlolgh atd th! Uh ""^'^^
growing deficienpv i',-, +i v. *^^re is a

~„, I ^^^^^

o

DAISY STATISTICS.

15

Imports. 1

Year.

Tear.

Butter.

Cheese. \

1871
1876
1880
1881
1882
1883
1884

cwts.
1,334,783
1,659,492
2,326,305
2,047,341
2,169,717
2,334,473
2,475,436

cwts.
1,216,400
1,531,204
1,775,997
1,840,090
1,694,623
1,799,704
1,927,139

1885
1886
1887
1888
1889
1890

Imports.

Butler.

cwts.
2,401,373
1,543,566
1,513,134
1,671,433
1,927,84-2
2,027,717

Clicese.

cwts.
1,833,832
1,734,890
1,836,789
1,917,616
1,907,999
2,144,074

Mabgabike.

1886
1887
1888
1889
1890

cwts.
887,974
1,276,140
1,139,743
1,241,690
1,079,856

Marg'arine was included with butter until 1886.
Taldnc. the imports and exports as our basis, the
consumption of imported butter and cheese per capita
s as Mlows. the addition of the figures given abo-
showing the total consumption per head of om
population per annum

Consan:ption of imported .
Consumption of home-made

Butter.

Clieese.

9-4

5-7

5-6

7-9

13-0

13-6

CHAPTEE II.

FOOD OP THE COW.

Pasturage-Stm^mer and Winter Feeding-Eelations of Pood to
Pasture-Malt and Barley-Crops of the Dairy Parzn EnsUate-!
Schemes of CiTltivation for Dairy Farms. -t-nsilage-

It is intended in this chapter to describe actual prac-
tice :n a number of instances of cow feeding; testate
such facts as are known on the relations of various foods
to the yield and quality of milk ; and to enumerate the
crops proper for cultivation on a dairy farm.

The Pood of the Cow in the common practice of our
Glairy districts is pasturage in summer, and hay and

chopped straw with, in most cases, turnips or mangel-
wurzel m vdnter. She will consume in depasturing

rom 1 to IX cwt. of grass daily, varying of coursf
according to age and size; or during seven months of
grazing as much as 12 to 16 tons of green food Pa=
tures which would by July have growth enough on them
to make from 20 to 40 cwts. of hay, and which will
when that is cut grow probably three-fifths as much
^ass after July 1st as they had grown before, will if
their growth be eaten down from week to week through-
out the season, have produced from 7 to 14 tons of
green food per acre. From IJ acres of the best grass
lands to as much as 2i of the poorer class will thus be

FOOD OF THE COW.

17

wanted for the summer maintenance of the cow. One
acre of whole grass and the aftermath of another
acre which had been mown for winter hay will in the
former case be sufficient for a cow ; and double that
extent will be needed in the latter case. The cow
T a thus receive fully i cwt. of hay daily during the
five winter months. In Gloucestershire 24 tons of hay
a head are considered an ample winter's allowance. In
Cheshire 2i to 3^ acres of grass land per cow are the
creneral allowance in order to supply sufficient summer
pasturage and winter provender; but the dairy farms
in that county generally have a larger proportion of
arable land attached to them, and it is common to give
the cows turnips, mangels and straw, as well as hay.
Cheshire dairy farmers are practical feeders, and add
hberal allowances of cake, bran, and maize-meal to the
ration when the cows are in full milk during winter.
Cabbage and grains are also used upon some farms.

In the now famous dairy counties of Ayrshire and
Wigtownshire the cows graze from May until October,
getting straw, turnips, and swedes, 5 to 7 tons per head,
from October until the following grazing season, together
with bean meal, cake, and oats at the rate of about 4 lbs.
a head. In some cases— a specific allowance being
made to the "bower" who manages the cows— the
allowance of meal is smaller, 280 lbs. a head for the actual
winter feeding. On many Scotch farms the food is
largely cooked-turnips, chaff, meal, and draff (grains),
where used, being boiled together and given to the cows
hot There is a very general practice m many parts of
England of mixing pulped roots (swedes in winter and
mangels in spring) and chaff together, and heaping a

18

THE DAIEY OF THK FAEM.

day before use, by wbich time it has heated. In some
cases grains, which have been purchased in summer
and pitted, are mixed with this " chop " ; in others, bran
meal, or malt culms are used instead. These mixtures
form the mam ration, while oat straw is given between
meals, and in some cases a little hay or even cake. The
economy of feeding depends upon the utilisation of the
food grown upon the farm, and both straw and roots
can be given with admirable results in combination
with a concentrated food such as cotton cake, bran, or
bean meal, all of which are rich in the constituent
nitrogenous matter, in which the coarse foods are
deficient. In Jersey and in the richer districts of
Normandy the cows are tethered upon clover, vetches,
lucerne, or trifolium incarnatum, with the best results,'
all these foods being rich in nitrogenous matter. In
Switzerland grass and hay are almost the only foods
used. In Holland, another excellent dairy country, the
same foods are the staple ; rape cake, however, is largely
used in winter. In Sweden, hay is the chief winter
food; while in Denmark, where arable land is more
abundant, mixed rations, with meal or rape-cake, are
much more general. It is now the practice to treat
the cow much more liberaUy during the winter months
and when she is dry than used to be the rule. The
bare condition in which, after calving, the cow was
often turned out to grass in spring is now quite
understood to be bad farm management. The laro'e
number of cows which are now brought to the pail in
autumn for the provision of milk in winter for the
supply of towns, makes, of course, the distinction which
used to obtain between winter and summer feeding no

FOOD OF THE COW.

19

longer applicable, and the yield of milk is often stimu-
lated by the most liberal treatment, both as regards food
and shelter. Great reliance is placed on grains by many
farmers, a bushel a day per cow, or even more, being
given, together with 12 to 18 lbs. of hay, and J cwt. of
roots, chiefly mangel, or, in place of the two last,
abundance of cut green food, clover, vetches, lucerne or
rye grass during summer. A common method is to
pasture the cows in summer, giving them cut green
food in addition towards autumn and in early summer,
and to feed in stalls or sheds on roots, grains, cake, and
hay, and steamed messes during winter. The practice
of giving warm mashes is more common in the north.
For small Ayrshire cows, the following has been found
a sufficient winter dietary on which to keep them in
full milk :— 30 to 40 lbs. of boiled turnips, with 6 lbs. of
cut straw, 2 gallons of grains, and 31bs. of bean-meal
mashed up in them, oat straw ad lib. being suppUed in
addition. Mr. Horsfall's winter feeding was remarkably
liberal, and he received his retm'n for it in the fattening
of his cows at the time they were giving milk. The
following is the report of his management to the
Eoyal Agricultural Society :-He had for four years
given his dairy cows rape-cake, of the kind termed
"green" cake, which imparted to the butter a finer
flavour than cake of any other description'; and in order
to induce them to eat it, he blended it with one-quarter
the quantity of malt-dust, one-quarter bran, and twice
the quantity of a mixture in equal proportions of bean-
straw, oat-straw, and oat-shells ; all well mixed up
together, moistened, and steamed for one hour. This
steamed food had a very fragrant odour, and was much

c 2

20

THE DAIBY OF THE PAEM.

relished by the cattle : it was given warm three times a
day, at the rate of about 7 lbs. to each cow (or 21 lbs.
daily). Bean-meal was also scattered dry over the
steamed food, cows in full milk getting 2 lbs. per day,
the others but little. When the animals had eaten up
this mixture, they were each suppHed daily with 28 lbs. to
35 lbs. of cabbages from October to December, of kohl-
rabi till February, or of mangels till grass time; each
cow having given to her, after each of the three feed-
ings, 4 lbs. of meadow hay (or 12 lbs. daily). The roots
were not cut, but given whole. The animals were twice
a day allowed to drink as much water as they desired.
Mr. Horsfall ultimately discontinued the use of bean-
meal, owing to its comparative price, and in its place,
along with about 6 lbs. of rape-cake, gave an additional
allowance of malt coombs, and 2 or 3 lbs. of maize-meal
per cow. On this food, in instances actually observed,
his cows gave 14 quarts of milk a day, at the same time
that they gained flesh at the rate of about one-quarter
of a cwt. per month.

Although summer grazing is the commonest and
simplest practice, yet everything depends upon the
quality of the grass. On poor herbage, especially that
deficient in clovers, it is usually found advantageous to
give the cows a daily allowance of cotton cake, the flow
of milk increasing, while the increased value of the
manm-e has the best effect upon the pasture, which is
gradually improved.

Relations of Food to Dairy Produce. — It is difficult
to say of any agricultural result how much of it is due-
to any particular cause ; and in the case of dairy pro-

FOOD OF THE COW. 21

duce so many causes contribute to the result that the
a«ty is increased The breed the nod.

vidual character of the cow, its treatment, and the
dllry management of its milk-all, as wel as the ood
which it receives, affect the quantity of butter or of
cheese which is obtained from it ; and thus comparative
experiments made in order to ascertaua the effect o
particular foods must be carried on lo a length of
time before their results can be considered tru^woithy^
Experiments which have been made by Sii John
Lawes, at Eothamsted, have furnished dairy farmers
with information of the most valuable nature. Sir
John says that 1 ton of milk (about 220 galls.) can be
p oduced per acre upon first-rate land, so tha a cow
Ling nearly 800 gallons would require 34 acres An
Le of very good pasture will increase the weight of a
:toreoxfroml,2001bs.tol,7001bs.,theincreasec^^^^^
ing from 300 lbs. to 350 lbs. of dry matter, of which 35 lbs.
would be nitrogenous. Now the dry matter contained m
800 gallons of milk would amount to more than 1,000 lbs

including nine times as much nitrogenous maU r a
was contained in the increase m the ox. Thus the
production of milk is shown to be much more exhaust-
ing than the production of meat by a grazmg ox.
Writ n' in ISsV Sir John Lawes said that dur-ing the
^ i r months his purchased food consisted of decort.
cated cotton cake and bran, the bran be.ng given on y
when the cows were taken in and stall-fed. A rule was
Idopted that when a cow gave 28 to 30 Ibs^ o m.m

Z caL shoufd be increased or decreased one-quarter

THE DAIRY OF THE FAEM.

LrelT%r ' f '''^ ' '^^y -

quantity being sometimes found to be too lame to be

belief that the hberal use of cotton cake considerably
retarded the faUing-off in the yield. The foirowing
table relating to the results at Eothamsted are most
interesting and instructive

Trs.

No. of
cows,

No. o(
weeks.

Galls,
per he.qtl.

1884
1885
1886

' 40
50
46

47
52
49

876
884
810

Cake Bran

consumed consum-.d

per Rail. oer aaU.

lbs. & or.f. lbs. & 02S.

1-7 0-12

4 i Z , ^^ii^^ted at Eothamsted that

4 lbs. 0 cotton cake and 31 lbs. of bran would produce
as much digestible nitrogenous and non-nitrJgenou
substances as M'ould produce 30 lbs. of milk The
experiments of Lawes and Gilbert suggest that'if suit-
able piirchased foods are given soon after calving, the
yield of milk can generally be increased, and that such
SSpTorer. '^'^ ^ '''''''''' become richer rather
The teaching of science has been of immense benefit
to those who have availed themselves of it, but the
maxims of ordmary experience shouldnever be neglected.

Crops and Foods for Dairy Stock.-The cultivation of
the crops suitable as food for dairy stock has been
described m another Handbook. At present a mere
hst will be given of these crops, with a reference to
then- probable yield per acre, the period of year
dunng which each is available, etc. (1.) Pastzcmge

FOOD OF THE COW.

23

The grass of old meadows ot good quality is ttie best
possible summer food for dairy cows. They will usually
consume from 1 cwt. upwards of green food daily. The
annual yield of grass from meadows will vary from 7 tons
per acre up to 14 tons, according to the season. It is avail-
able in this cUmate generally from early in May till the
middle of November or later, during which time an
ordinary cow will consume fi-'om 10 to 14 tons of green
food. (2.) Hay, well made from good meadows, is the
very best food for dairy cows. It is, however, greatly
economised by the addition of straw and roots, meal,
and cake, but when given alone must be supphed at the
rate of 40 lbs. daily, or thereabouts, a head. (3.) The
Clovers afford capital grazing for yomig stock, and on
arable dairy farms to milch cows also. They may yield on
good land, well cultivated, in two or even three cuttings,
if the season be favourable, 10, 6, and 4 tons respec-
tively per acre ; or from 12 to 13 tons per acre during
the season. If the cattle are foddered, as in small
dairies they may be, these and other green foods must
be supphed at the rate of fully one cwt. daily. They are
available from June or July till October. (4.) Vetches
sown in October, and again in April, May, and June,
may be made to provide a succession of food all through
the summer, commencing in May. They yield one
cutting, which may furnish from 6 to 10 tons of green
food per acre : a very succulent food if given before its
flowers appear ; and the better, therefore, for being cut
12 to 24 hours before use, in order to wither and pre-
vent cattle being blown. Vetches may be given with
excellent effect chopped with straw. (5.) Bye, cut green,
is one of the earliest of spring foods ; sown from July

24

THE DAIRY OP THE FAEM.

to September, it is available in April and May, yielding
perhaps four or five tons per acre of green food, and more
as the crop approaches maturity, when of course it be-
comes less appropriate as a summer food. (6.) Italian
Bye-grass is one of the best forage plants for cows when
cultivated liberally. If manured abundantly after each
cutting, especially if the dressing can be washed in by irri-
gation, another cutting, weighing sometimes 10 or even
15 tons per acre, will be ready in a few weeks. And as
many as five heavy cuttings have been obtained from it in
the season on sewage farms. When sufficiently ripened,
it is one of the best possible cut foods that can be given to
cows, inducing an abundant yield of excellent milk. (7.)
Lucerne, on deep, rich, and sheltered soil will also yield a
succession of cuttings of excellent food for cows, weighing
on an average from 6 to 8 tons per acre at each cutting.
(8.) Sainfoin may be classed with the clovers as to
quality and quantity of produce, but it rarely produces
two heavy cuts in a year. Like lucerne, it is available
for several years on the same land, requiring of course to
be manured if constantly cut; it is suitable for calcareous
soils, where clovers are not generally so successful;
and it yields probably 10 to 12 tons of green food'
under good management, per acre. (9.) Gorse, crushed
and given with other food, is liked by cows, and has
been successfully used in dairies. It is available during
November and the winter months, and, given at the
rate of two bushels of the bruised material along with
carrots and a little hay, is one of the most useful
winter foods for cows in milk. (10.) Rape is useful in
early winter; it is less hable to affect the flavour of milk
than tm-nips, and is a very succulent and palatable food.

FOOD OF THE COW.

25

Capable of being mown and brouglit in daily from the
field, it is available as a daily food during September,
October, and November, and, indeed, formed a portion
of Mr. Horsfall's feeding of his well-managed dairy
herd. A crop of rape will yield from 10 to 12 tons of
green food per acre. (11.) Cabbages of various sorts,
open and hearted, early and late, are much reHshed
by cows, and, when liberally manured, will yield a suc-
cession of food from May all through the summer, and
on till the end of the year. Land yielding successive
crops of cabbages will produce an enormous weight of
food— even 40 or 50 tons per acre during the season.
No more than half a cwt. a day, supplemented with
more substantial food, preferably of a nitrogenous and
binding nature, such as bean or pea meal, or decor-
ticated cotton cake, should be given to a cow ; and care
should be taken to remove any spoiled portions of the
ration, which, if consumed, would greatly aggravate the
disagreeable flavour which, under the most careful
management, they are apt to give to the milk. (12.)
Turnips, common and Swedish, are given to cows, the
former in early winter, the latter on till towards spring.
They will yield from 10 to 20, and even 25 tons per
acre, but they are a faulty food, owing to the flavour
which, without special management, when used in large
quantities, they give to the milk. Sixty to eighty
lbs. daily, along with an unlimited supply of straw, is
an ordinary daily ration on some farms. These roots
are less liable to affect the milk if steamed, or even if
merely pulped, but in any case the crown should be cut
off low down ; 15 or 20 tons of common turnips per
acre, and 12 to 15 tons of Swedish turnips, are an

THE DAIRY OF THE FARM.

ordinary crop, but they are liable to so many casualties
trom weatber, insects, etc., tbat absolute "dependence
cannot be placed on them for a small dairy. Swedes are
not only better food than common turnips, but they
tamt the milk less readily, and keep much better.
(Id.) Mangel-iourzels are the best root crop for late
winter and spring feeding of milch cows. Not more than
from 40 lbs. to 70 lbs. should be given daily when they
are the sole dependence along with hay and straw ; but
a smaller quantity, pulped and given with richer food
IS better management, especially in butter dairies'
Ibirty tons of mangels per acre can be grown more
easily than 20 tons of turnips on suitable soils, and in
the following spring and summer they are better food
per ton. (14.) KoM-rabi is a hardy and useful crop on
dairy farms, yielding, perhaps, 12 or 14 tons of bulbs, and
a useful top as well, which cattle eat with rehsh (15 )
Carrots, especially the large Belgian sorts, can be grown
with great advantage in a free soil; 10 to 12 tons are a good
ordinary crop. They do not give a disagi-eeable flavour
to the milk, and are extremely palatable to the cattle.
Half a cwt. may be given daily with other food with
great advantage. (16.) Parsnips, while not quite so
palatable as carrots, are very nutritive, and extremely
valuable for milk production. Of the large Jersey
parsnips, 10 or 12 tons per acre have been grown. (17 ^
Potatoes, when steamed, prove an excellent cow food •
they are sometimes used raw, but with less advantage '
as compared with Swedes and mangels they are not
economical. (18.) Straw of our various corn and pulse
crops IS used as winter fodder in the cow-vard. Cooked
bean straw, if the crop has been well harvested and cut

FOOD OF THE COW.

27

before it was dead ripe, is nutritious fodder. Pea-straw,
if free from mildew, is also good food ; and clean wheat,
oat, or barley straw with a few Swedes is often almost
the sole fodder of dry cows and young stock through the
winter ; a pound or two of cotton cake should, however,
be added. If straw is cut into chaff, and wetted with hot
and salt linseed soup, made at the rate of about 1 lb. of
the linseed to each head of cattle, and mixed with some
pulped roots, store stock can thus be kept in very good
condition through the winter. Next to good bean straw
oat straw is to be preferred, but it should have been
saved in good condition. Corn straw is the most valu-
able when it has been grown with seeds, a portion of
which will have been cut with it. In any case a few
turnips or mangels should be given to dry cows and
growing stocks, or failing these 1 lb. to 3 lbs. of linseed
or cotton cake, or a mixture of both. (19.) Meal of the
various grains — wheat, barley, oats — or of beans, peas,
linseed and Indian corn, is used more or less in cases
where rich feeding of dairy cows is adopted. Bean,
pea, oat and India-meal and bran are probably more
commonly used than any other, and the first-named is
especially fitted as food for cows in milk; a few pounds
mixed with the daily rations is generally well repaid. It
should be mentioned that cake is always a safer food
than corn meal, especially that made from wheat or
barley.

Linseed, ground or bruised, forms a useful addition
to the steamed or boiled mess given to the cow. It may
be given to the extent of 2 lbs. daily. A good plan where
an engine and boiler are kept is to mix in a tanlc with one
pail of water per cow, and cook it with the waste steam.

28

THE DAIRY OF THE FAHil.

In this way it forms an admirable addition to chopped
and pulped foods. (20.) Cakes made from the various oil-
producing seeds are among the best of cattle foods.
Linseed cake stands high on the list, as it is the most
costly, but cotton-seed cake, produced from decorticated
seed, has taken a very high place among our cattle
foods. It must not be supposed that cake is specially
adapted for the enrichment of milk in butter fat, and,
therefore, for butter production solely on account of the
high percentage of oil it contains. This oil has its value,
assisting as it does in the maintenance of the condition
of the cow; but it is the nitrogenous matter in the cake
which places it above all other foods. Decorticated
cotton cake, which has been shown by repeated experi-
ments to be more economical than the common cotton
cake, is perhaps the cheapest of all concentrated milk-
producing foods, taking into account the high value of
the manure produced from it. (21.) Malt culms or
sprouts are a most useful milk-producing food, highly
nitrogenous, communicating a most agreeable flavour
and odour to chop, and iisually moderate in price.
(22.) Molasses are sometimes used for dairy cows, and
3 or 4 lbs., mixed with a quantity of chaff and turnips,
induces a larger consumption of comparatively unpalat-
able food. (23.) Of all the foods used where cows are
stall fed, none excels brewers' grains for stimulating the
production of poor milk : from 2 to 4 pecks daily are
given to each cow. By gradually mixing a little with
their ordinary ration, they will ultimately take them
greedily. Grains from the smaller breweries are
believed to be the best. They are used largely in town
dairies. They diminish in value, however, with every

29

FOOD OP THE COW.

taprove.ne„t in the processes adoptea f °f

„e now toed, »f m^^i/t„ become poputa

»lb„mmous matter, mi ^ He, are

in country dairies ; by 'J':! V „et grains (24.)
easily bronght to the cond, 10° ' wet » ^

-ptbrr:ae1:P^^^^^^^^^
-;S;::be^rorra,t:iI,sstnnniatestbe

-Sirs::: rStion. w^at . .r^ny a
onrcec^sr^crU^^^^^^^^^^^

^"°°°:rt";*™nf;n etdteek cnt into cbaff,
grass cnt J"'"" ty, is now a not mi-

andpaelsed and f''^"'"'- j 50 jbs. of grass

common experience. C"""* ^^^^^ ^„ch
silage, some grains, 2 01 6 „^ I„

,. yi»li;^f -'^ tte trodden as^
SMltyttpUa.^^^^^
required depth and weight .. d the «o^ the silo is

-xv;'h=Zt:^^^^^^^^^

foL-^rsSTd ----

30

THE DAIRY OF THE PAEM.

conversion, the grass has suffered a loss of feeding
matter.

The Cropping of land for the Cow, notwithstanding
the variety of foods available for her use, is generally a
very simple matter. Almost all the butter and cheese
produced m this country is made from cows which are
fed upon grass in summer, and upon hay, roots— i.e.,
turnips and mangels— and straw, with the addition of
cakes and meal, in winter; while the milk supplied
by town-fed cows comes from brewers' grains, to-
gether with cabbage, cut vetches, and clover in sum-
mer, and hay, mangel, and similarly concentrated foods
to the above, in the winter. There is, however, room
for a great deal more economy in the utihsation of the
dairy farm, by adapting the arable portion more directly
to cow-feeding, and so enabling the occupier to keep a
larger stock of cattle. Let us take an instance or two
of small farms available for dairy management, and see
how far arable crops enable us to increase the stock of
dairy cows beyond the " one to every three acres "
which IS the average of our ordinary dairy districts
The foUowmg paragraphs describe actual cases in which
the advice of the writer was applied for :—

(1.) "Hill Side " had 15 acres of poor grass land and
35 acres of arable land, 5 of which were in sainfoin.
Let us see how many cows the occupier could keep.
The 20 acres of grass and sainfoin may be supposed to
yield 200 tons of green food; and of the 30 acres of
arable land, 20 acres in clover, mangel-wurzel, carrots,
parsnips, and Swedish turnips, might produce annually
nearly 400 tons ; while the remaining 10 acres in grain

FOOD OF THE COW.

31

crops would produce, say, 15 tons of straw : 580 tons ox
food, at 120 lbs. each per day, would keep 20 or 25
cows throughout the year, and 15 tons of straw would
litter them in winter. This calculation is based upon
data which will be found true, whether the grass be made
into hay or not. The following is a rotation which would
bring out the quantities and kinds of produce suggested.
Let half the sainfoin and nearly half the grass land be
mown each year, and 5 acres of the arable land be m
clover, to be cut and carried to the cattle in the house.
The 30 acres of arable land may be divided into 6 fields
of 5 acres each. 1st year, corn sown with clover seeds;
2nd year, clover ; 3rd year, swedes ; 4th year, corn ;
5th year, mangel-wurzel ; 6th year, carrots. Vetches
or rye might be taken after a portion of the clover lay
and cut in time for white turnips.

Summer food. Winter food.

5 acres of oloTer 60 tons.

5 „ swedes
5
5
5
15

100 tons.

mangel-wurzel ... 80 „ and 80 „

carrots 30 „ „ 30 „

sainfoin 30 „ » 30 »

meadow ... ... 80 „ » 60 „

280 300

Of course the 60 tons of grass produce put down to
the column of winter food is given as hay, but that does
not affect its valuation as food. Here, then, by the aid
of arable produce we might be able to provide daily
food throughout the year equal to the maintenance of a
herd of 20 to 25 cows on a poor farm of 50 acres if it
were well manured and managed. A medium farm of
50 acres, wholly of pasture, would not, as a general

32

THE DAIBY OF THE FARM.

rule, keep more than two-thirds of the stock for which
food is thus provided. The crops suggested are heavy,
but land liberally cultivated under such a rotation
ought to yield well. In this, as in similar cases, great
help to the crops as well as to the cattle would be
afforded by the liberal use of cotton cake and other
such foods, and the careful protection of the liquid and
solid manure.

(2.) The following is the case of a dairy farm of 35
acres of meadow and 25 acres of arable land: — The
cows are stall, box, or shed fed during the winter and
during part of spring and autumn. Let us suppose
them to be under shelter 200 days in the year. Each
cow must have about 8 lbs. of litter daily ; she may be
kept fairly comfortable with this quantity, although it is
certainly a scanty allowance ; she will thus require
14 cwts. per annum, so that 25 cows will require about
17 tons — a quantity which may be supposed to grow on
12 acres, the half of the arable land.

The arable land, then, may be cropped thus : —

1 acre of lucerne.
12 acres of g-raiu crop, or 6 of wheat and 6 of oats.
6 acres (after wheat) — 3 of mangels, 2 of Italian rye-grass (or

trifoliiun), and 2 of vetches.

The two latter succeeded by 4 acres of swedes.
6 acres (after oats) — 3 of mangels, and 3 of carrots.

Of the pasture land : —

1.8 acres may be mown, and
1 7 acres dejoastured, each year.

The following, accordingly, will be the produce of

FOOD OP THE COW

33

green food for consumption, besides the straw of the
12 acres of grain: —

18 acres of hay, equal to 30 tons of hay ; which may be

considered equal in green food to ... 120 tons

18 acres of aftermath, equal to

17 acres depastured, equal to

1 acre of lucerne, equal to

2 acres of Italian rye-grass (or trifolium), eqxial to ... 20

2 acres of vetches, equal to 20

5 acres of mangels, equal to

4 acres of swedes, equal to

3 acres of white carrots, equal to

Or in all 701 tons

60
190
16

140
75
36

a quantity equal to nearly 2 tons of green food a day,
which will keep 26 to 30 cows very well. And the crops
may all be used in proper season. Beginning with
October, till February the cows will be feeding on
grass (except during severe weather), carrots, swedes,
and hay ; till April, on carrots, mangels, and hay ; till
July, on grass, mangels, rye-grass, vetches, and hay ;
during summer, on grass in the fields and lucerne.
Some growers will be tempted to take a second cut of
rye-grass, but the swedes will prove the better crop,
both as an immediate food and as a preliminary
to grain. Where swedes cannot be got in after rye-
grass and vetches, turnips or cabbage (also an
admirable milk-producer) can. In the southern
counties trifolium incarnatum may be followed by
swedes, turnips, cabbage, and rape. In addition to
this stock, two horses will be kept, and food must be
provided, or displaced, for them by the purchase of 40Z.
worth of oats and hay. It is plain that other crops

34

THE DAIBT OP THE FARM,

might have a place in the scheme. Cabbages which
admit of transplanting in a forward stage of growth
from seed-beds to any land from which the crop has
just been taken, will be certain to have a place on such
a dairy farm, especially in filhng up all gaps in the
root crops.

These instances will be considered cases of high
farmmg ; but the ordinary experience of dairy farmers,
who only keep one cow to every three or even four acres
of pasture, is more generally improved upon in a less
vigorous way by the cultivation of a few acres of roots,
in order to economise the winter's consumption of hay'
to render less hay-making necessary, and to make
more acres of the pasture available for summer
feeding; thus providing for more cows on summer
grass, which is the most productive of milk, although
the milk is worth less per gallon.

A large crop of food may generally be taken by
planting cabbages after vetches or trifolium, before
turnips go in, for autumn and winter consumption,
or after early-cut oats, for consumption in spring;
although much depends upon the part of the country
in which the farm is situated. Vetches should be sown
in successive patches, in order to yield a succession of
food during the summer months; but it should be
arranged for the early vetches to be sown in autumn,
preferably after the winter oat crop, and the late ones
in spring. There is no time for a second crop after
the latter, if the ground is to be occupied during the
following year by corn ; otherwise cabbage plants may
be advantageously planted. In the southern half of
England, maize, producing from twelve to twenty tons

FOOD OF THE COW.

35

an acre, maybe successfully sown in the first ten days of
June, four years out of five, for cutting in September
and October; thus materially assisting in extending
the desirable system of double cropping. Maize is not
only a bulky crop, but containing a large percentage of
sugar it is much rehshed by the cows, which eat it
greedily. Moreover, it is, with the exception of lucerne,
which can only be grown upon selected soils, the only
forage crop which grows luxuriantly during drought,
thus affording abundance of food when the pastures are
bare, and the farmer is in extreme dif&culty as to how to
feed his cattle. It requires liberally feeding with dung,
and is most easily grown, 1^ bushels per acre being
strewed in every other furrow after the plough. It
must be harrowed and well rolled in. Drilling and
broad-casting are useless methods of sowing, as the
rook will at once take the seed; and for this reason
precaution is necessary when the young plant first
appears.

CHAPTEE III.

CHOICE AND TREATMENT OP THE COW.

Dairy Breeds : Shorthorns, Bed Polls, Jersey, Guernsey, Ayrshire,
Dutch, and Kerry— Individual Character: Age, Form, Other
Characteristics — Treatment of Cow : Housing, Health, "Winter
MiUc, Diseases, Miliing— The Calf : Rearing and Feeding.

The various breeds of cattle known to English agri-
culture, and their ordinary management, have been
already described in a " Handbook on the Live Stock of
the Farm," but it is necessary that such peculiarities of
breed, age, and individual character should be referred
to as ought to guide the choice of the purchaser.

The Dairy Breeds of Cattle. — Of the many distinct
breeds of cattle cultivated in the United Kingdom, only
six can be enumerated as strictly dairy breeds. Among
these are the Shorthorn, the Eed Poll, the Jersey, the
Guernsey, the Ayrshire, and the Kerry. — (1.) The
Shorthorn is the principal dairy breed of these islands.
In Gloucestershire there was, and still is to some extent,
a dark red, or brindled cow, of medium size, with
almost black extremities, though sometimes with a
streak of white along the back : but it is now becoming
rare. In Cheshire also there was a native breed more
or less resembling the Lancashire and Midland Counties
Long-horned breed; but either by substitution or by

CHOICE AND TREATMENT OP THE COW.

crossing, the Yorkshire cow, essentially a Shorthorn, is
displacing it. This, therefore, is at present pecuUarly
the milk-producing breed of the country. Its improve-
ment as a milker has been marked during the present
decade, and its capacity to yield milk, butter, or cheese
is greater than that of any other cow bred by British
farmers. Elsewhere the Devon, a much smaller animal,
yields a lesser quantity of milk, although this is of
high quality ; the Hereford, an animal of nearly equal
size, is also deficient in its yield, and in neither of these
counties does the prevalence of a pecuHar breed pro-
duce anything like a general and important dairy
husbandry. The London milk dairies are almost exclu-
sively composed of the Shorthorn cow, and excepting
in Suffolk, Ayrshire, and the Channel Islands, it is ex-
tending more or less into every dairy district of the
country. It has the advantage over all other breeds,
that its calves make more valuable oxen, and its cows,
after five or six years' milking, are more easily turned
into beef. The milk, compared with that of other dairy
breeds, is remarkable rather for quantity than quaUty,
and therefore it is adapted either for direct consump-
tion or for the production of cheese, rather than that
of butter; yet the London Dairy Show trials have
shown that the milk of many Shorthorns is of excep-
tionally high quality, and that by carefully selecting
stock, a high-class butter-making herd could easily be
formed. Good Shorthorn cows are now offered for
sale in almost every considerable market in the king-
dom. The northern fairs, however, as those of Yarm,
NorthaUerton, Darlington, and Newcastle-on-Tyne,
furnish an excellent choice. Northampton, Stow-in-

38

THE DAIRY OP THE FAEM.

the-Wold (Gloucestershire), and the best markets in
Bucks, Derbyshire, North Lancashire, and Westmore-
land are also noteworthy. The best young cows just
calved are worth from iG22 to ^30 a-piece : prices, how-
ever, vary from year to year.

(2.) The Bed Polls of Norfolk and Suffolk, a hornless
red breed, are of great excellence for the dairy. Like
all good dairy cows, they are narrow and small before,
compared with the development of the hind-quarters.
They are good milkers, and as the Suffolk dairies are
mostly managed for the production of butter, the milk
is of excellent quality. The Suffolk Poll probably
yields as large a quantity of milk in proportion to its size
as any other breed in England, and it therefore
deserves more attention, as furnishing suitable animals
for small home dairies, than, except in its own district,
it has received. The polled Suffolk cow is purchasable
at almost any of the fairs in Suffolk and the adjoining
county of Norfolk.

(3.) The Jersey and the Guernsey breeds, in which
faults as fattening stock and merits as milk-producers are
combined, are the favourites of the small or household
dairy. ^ The great, almost deer-like beauty of the head,
and, indeed, in the well-bred Jersey, of its whole
form, makes it an ornament to the park or paddock ;
the unexcelled richness of its milk enables it to meet a
demand for cream ; and its small size makes it at once
less mischievous in winter in the field, and more easily
managed in the house. The quahty of the milk is so
good that notunfrequentlyone (or more) of this breed is
kept even in large dairies, where the large-framed Short-
horn forms the majority of the herd, for the sake of the

CHOICE AND TEEATMENT OF THE COW.

39

enrichment of their produce by the mixture of its own.
The best fairs at which to purchase Channel Island
cows are held on the islands themselves. Sales by
auction are, however, almost weekly advertised in the
London papers, where these and other imported breeds
are offered. The price reached is 20 guineas, and
higher, for well-bred young stock. The fawn-like
Jersey has an equal rival in the yellow and white
Guernsey, a larger cow, yielding as much or more milk
of an equal quahty, with a frame and character better
calculated either to carry beef or to admit of crossing
with other beef-producing breeds.

(4.) The Ayrshire, though too small for the most
productive pastures of our Enghsh dairy districts, and
involving, owing to the great number that must be kept
on a given extent of ground, more labour than the
larger dairy cattle there prevalent, is one of the most
useful dairy animals we have. It possesses, more per-
fectly, perhaps, than any other variety, the external
features which a good dairy cow ought to exhibit, and
withal it displays a greater aptitude to fatten than
either of the other small dairy breeds. It yields a
remarkable quantity of excellent milk, which, if less
rich than that of the Guernsey or Jersey cow, is better
adapted for economical cheese-making. It is generally
red and white, small boned, with light fore-quarters,
and with longish horns gracefully set on the head.
Good Ayrshire cows are to be obtained at all West of
Scotland fairs and markets. The best bred animals
have a " fancy" price, and as much as 181. to 251. are
asked for good young cattle in milk.

(5.) The Dutch, a large black and white breed, large

40

THE DAIBY OE THE FABM.

horned and somewhat ungainly in appearance, has a
great reputation, both in this country and America, for
Its large yield of milk, which, however, is often of poor
quahty. The Dutch cow is most carefully bred in
Holland, the herd-books being kept with jealous
carefulness. At the Amsterdam International Ex-
hibition in 1884 we saw a few cows which had recorded
phenomenal yields, although no animal in the milkina
classes showed anything unusual by her performance''
Cows have, however, been frequently imported into
England which have given over 1,000 gallons of milk
m a year, although in many cases their subsequent
yields have been much less satisfactory. It seems
however, to be reserved for American breeders to
achieve the best results with this breed, for they
have frequently recorded 1,500 gallons in a year
and m some instances over 2,000 gallons. One cow,'
Parthenia, a six-year-old, has a record of 548 lbs. of
milk and 35J lbs. of butter in seven days, an average
of nearly 8 gallons per day.

(6.) The Improved Kerry breed of cattle is remark-
able for Its small size and comparatively large yield of
rich milk. This character it possesses in common with
other small and mountain breeds of cattle. The
Anglesea breed, for instance, a race of black cattle, are
often spoken of as deserving more attention for the
dairy than they receive ; and the small Breton cow is
another of the same class, which was imported in
considerable numbers for household dairy use, before
the exclusion of live cattle from France. None of
these breeds are, however, comparable with the
Ayrshire, the Suffolk, or the Channel Island cow for

CHOICE AND TEBATMENT OF THE COW.

41

such purposes, and still less can they compete with the
Shorthorns for use on large dairy farms. Selected
Kerries of the improved type, however, are far superior
to the Kerries of the Irish farms, and are worthy of
. the attention of owners of small dairies.

Age and Individual Character. — These are the
features which should chiefly guide the purchaser of a
cow. The breeds that have been named will assist
him in making a choice, simply because in them
individual character does receive, to a certain extent, a
classification. Thus, the characteristics of a cow
embrace such particulars as size, docility, form,
aptitude to fatten, and proved productiveness as to
milk; but the cows of any given breed more or less
resemble one another in all these points, and a refer-
ence therefore has been made to those particular breeds
in which, as regards fitness for the dairy, the combina-
tion of all these qualities is best. It is, however, the
actual possession of these characteristics in the
individual, and not the fact of its belonging to a dairy
breed of acknowledged excellence, that constitutes its
merit ; and it may be well, therefore, to point out
those particulars with which excellence for the dairy
is generally connected. (1.) As to age:* there is
nothing more unprofitable than an old cow. In the
ordinary practice of the dairy, unless a cows aborts or
becomes barren, she is kept probably five or six years
in milk, being sold when eight or nine years old;

♦Forindicationsof age, and many other particulars not specially
called for in a Handbook of Dairy Husbandry, see "Handbook of the
Live Stock of the Farm "—(Vinton and Co.).

42

THE DAIRY OF THE FARM.

this IS the general practice, simply because at that ac^e
the quantity, as well as the quahty, of her milk falls
off so much, that it is better to replace her with a
younger animal; but as a cow is sometimes of such
hrst-rate quahty as to induce her owner to keep her as
long as she will breed, so oftentimes it is well to part
with an inferior cow after a year or two's experience of
her The cow is generally at her prime after her third
or_ fourth calf. In Ayrshire, when cows are let to
dairymen, three heifers with their first calf are
estimated as equal to two cows. (2.) As to form a
good cow, of whatever size, is generally lighter in her
fore-quarters than behind; she should be especially
wide and deep at the loins, her skin should handle thin
and soft, her udder should be of full size, broad
reaching well forward, and back between the hind
legs; It should not be baggy, but level with the base of
the stomach, and fine and silky to the fingers ; the teats
should be placed symmetrically on it, neither too close
nor too wide apart, and it should be ascertained
that they are all perfect-that the cow has not
as It is said, lost any of her " quarters." This would
really constitute a loss of one-quarter of her milk • for
the udder is not a bag from which the teats are four
common outlets for the fluid it contains. Each of
hese outlets has connected with it a separate apparatus
for the secretion of milk; so that, on the one hand, if
one fail or be diseased, wholesome nourishment for the
young may still be obtained from the others; but so
also on the other, that the loss of a teat is equal to a
real loss of one-fourth the milk-producing ability of the
animal. The milk veins in connection with the udder

CHOICE AND TREATMENT OP THE CO"W. 43

should be prominent and large. The head should be
rather long and narrow, except at the muzzle, and the
neck rather thin than otherwise ; the extremities gener-
ally should be fine. (3.) Among other characteristics
of a good dairy cow, quietness and docility of tempera-
ment is a point of capital importance.

In selecting a young cow attention may often
advantageously be paid to the milking capacity of her
dam and the " milking blood " of the sire, if details are
known and can be obtained.

Treatment of the Cow. — The proper treatment of the
cow in milk, which has been separated from its calf,
consists simply in giving it suitable food and water at
regular times, allowing it sufficient exercise for its
health, keeping it clean and warm, and milking it
properly and regularly. The subject of food has been
already sufficiently discussed, and the necessity, espe-
cially when comparatively dry food is given, of an ample
supply of water being allowed, has been insisted on.
Where the animal is house-fed, it should be fed on
succulent and dry food alternately, and at least four
times a day, allowing ample intervals for rumination.
In any case she could be allowed access to a pasture or
a yard for exercise during the middle of the day in
winter, and early and late during summer. But it is
of course much the better plan, where possible, to have
daily access to the pasture field for food as well as
exercise all the year round. (1.) The coio-house may
be an enclosed shed with a trough along its inner side,
and upright posts every 6 J to 7 feet, carrying a sliding
ring and neck strap, by which two cows are attached

44

THE DAIRY OF THE PABM.

each to its place ; this shed should be open to the south,
and entirely closed against the weather by both window
and door, in winter. Or it may be a series of " boxes,"
which may be 9 feet square, or 8 feet by 10, in which the
cow remains during the winter season, being littered
daily, rising in her lair by the continual addition of the
hard-trod straw and excrement. The trough in this case
must be capable of being raised as the floor of the box
rises, and if it be hung on two pins at each end between
two uprights, bored every three inches or so to receive
these pins, this raising can easily be effected ; and there
will be this additional advantage, that by withdrawing
the upper pin at either end after the food has been con-
sumed, the trough will turn over bottom upwards, so
as to hinder the cow from dirtying it. If cows are con-
fined permanently in this way, water must be " laid
on " to troughs to which they have access. Much the
most common cow-house, however, is that in which a.
double row of cows is tied in couples to a long manger
at either side, leaving a wide interval or passage in the
centre for the easy removal of the dung and the easy
handling of Htter. A sufficiency of straw for warmth
and cleanliness must be provided ; 10 to 15 lbs. a day
a-piece will be needed in the boxes : rather less will
suffice for stalls. Some farmers, however, use no litter,
the cow standings, usually made of dry earth or chalk,'
being very short, as in Holland, with gutters behind
into which the manure falls. Others use peat litter-
or sawdust. The best mangers are of semi-circular
glazed hardware, laid with the upper rim 9 inches
above the floor. The stalls should be 5 feet to 5
feet 6 inches long, the gutters 5 to 6 inches deep by

CHOICE AND TEEATMENT OP THE COW. 45

10 inches wide, with a curb of grooved firebrick. Ex-
cept in feeding-boxes, the dung should be removed at
least every morning and evening, and fresh htter sup-
plied at night. Where oat straw is given as food, suffi-
cient will usually be left for litter. It is an additional
security for cleanhness, and a comfort and advantage to
the animals, if they are occasionally curry-combed. In
all cases ample space and sufficient ventilation should
be provided, and at all times, of course, kind and gentle
treatment must be insisted on. An animal so sensitive
as a cow, whose produce is dependent so much upon its
health and even temper, abundantly rewards quietness,
and punctuality, and liberality of treatment. On the
subject of patience and gentleness in dealing with the
cow, it may be well to add that they are especially
needed in dealing with a heifer rearing her first calf,
and just commencing to be milked, and with the calf
itself from first to last.

(2.) Health. The cow goes with young nine months
and a week, or thereabouts. Of 760 cows, whose period
was observed by Lord Spencer, 600 calved between the
279th day and the 291st day, and the births were pretty
evenly distributed over the intervening period, reach-
ing a maximum about the 284th day. 314 cows calved
before the 284th day, and 310 cows calved after the
285th day ; and it is noteworthy that a larger proportion
of bull calves came at late births, and a larger propor-
tion of cow calves at the earlier births. Thus of 381
calves dropped after the 284th day, 233 were males and
148 females ; and of 294 calves dropped before the 284th
day, 135 were male and 159 were female. On the
whole, the number of males produced by this very

i6

THE DAIRY OP THE FARM.

large number of cows was considerably above that of
females.

_ Of abortion it may be mentioned that while some-
times, owing to accident or ill-health at the time of its
occurrence, it is not often (probably not at aU) produced
by eating ergoted grass as is popularly supposed. The
disease is now believed to be the work of an organism
communicated by infected cattle, and the greatest care
should be exercised in the introduction of new cows into
a herd in consequence. In cases of abortion, the animal
(which should at once be isolated), together with those
in the same house with her, should be disinfected by
well syringing the vagina with warm water, in which
carbohc acid (1 in 50) has been mixed. A bull should
never be allowed to season a cow which has aborted •
should he do so, the sheath should be well disinfected
by syringing with the dilute carbohc acid. The foetus
after-birth, and discharge fi'om an aborting cow should
be burned or buried in hme, and the stall or shed in
which the animal has stood should be thoroughly
cleansed and disinfected before it is used for any other
cows. Abortion is clearly infectious, and may run
through an entire herd, unless vigorous treatment is
adopted directly it appears. As a cow which has
aborted once will probably do so again, the best plan is
to at once prepare her for the butcher, even while
milking.

In the ordinary practice of our dairy districts, where
it is desired that the cows be in full milk, and their
calves be all, or nearly all, weaned by the time they turn
out to grass, it is common to let the bull run with them
from the end of May or thereabouts.— PTwi^er Milk.

CHOICE AND TEEATMENT OF THE COW. 47

Wlien a constant supply of milk, whether required for
the market or for use in a household, is to be supplied
continuously throughout the year, it is necessary either
to have spring and autumn calvers, or to replace dry
cows by those more recently calved. The cow should
be dried at least sis weeks before calving. Simply but
gradually ceasing to milk it is sufficient for this
purpose. The parturition of the cow generally takes
place without any need of assistance, but in case of
difficulty a properly-quaHfied practitioner must be
called in, hence the importance of the cowman being
in attendance. Before calving, the cow, unless in
poor condition, should for a few weeks be placed on
poor pasture, except in winter, when her ration should
be simple in the extreme, but immediately after-
wards she may receive warm mashes twice a day, with
her usual food for two or three days ; these are made
simply by pouring boiling water over bran — a peck or
thereabouts at a time— and letting it remain until cool
enough to give it as food. Steamed turnips maybe
mashed up with it, and a pint of oatmeal will make it
still more nourishing. In calves the " hush " or " hoose,"
a cough produced by worms in the windpipe, is pre-
vented by good water and sufficient food, and keeping
them from damp grass to which the sun does not pene-
trate ; it may possibly be cured by lime-water, "half a pint
daily," or turpentine in linseed oil, " one ounce in four,
once a week." This should be taken along with entire
change of food, as, for instance, removal to old sainfoin
in an upland district, and an allowance of Unseed cake.
— Quarter-ill is another disease of young animals,
causing almost sudden death, often owing to change of

48

THE DAIRY OP THE FARM.

food or exposure to cold. It is best prevented by
uniform treatment as to feeding, and warm and com-
fortable housing.— Hoven, in which the stomach is
■distended by the gases produced during imperfect
digestion, is the consequence of greedy or rapid feeding
on too succulent food. An ounce of ammonia in a pint
of water will greatly relieve ; if not, the left flank is
sometimes stabbed downwards between the hip bone
and rib, and the gases liberated, a " trochar,"
leaving a " canula " in the wound allowing the passage
of the gas, being used for the -prnT^ose.— Purging, or
scour, in calves is generally treated by a drachm or two of
carbonate of soda, given in warm milk, which helps to
dissolve the indigestible curd in the stomach. A com-
monly successful remedy is to give castor oil, which
often removes the troublesome secretion at the onset.
There should be no delay in the treatment of scour, for
■cure is hopeless when it reaches a certain stage.— ^e«Z-
water is a disease of the liver, accompanied by scouring,
and dark-coloured urine ; the medicine should contain
calomel and Epsom salts.— The drop after calving, a
paralysis, is prevented by allowing the cow sufficient
exercise, and keeping her in good health before calving.
In suspected or fleshy cows, there is no better treat-
ment than that of turning them into a poor pasture
when dried, and allovsdng them to calve there. A
drench of Epsom salts, ^ lb. dissolved in warm
water, and given twenty-four hours before calving,
is effective. — Foot-and-mouth disease is accompanied
by sore feet and blistered mouth. — And Pleuro-
pneumonia, an infectious disease of the lungs,
necessitates notice to the authorities, who prescribe

CHOICE AND TEEATMENT OF THE COW.

49

somewlaat severe treatment.— Diseases of the skin, as
ringworm and lice, are to be avoided by cleanliness and
cm-ry-combing, also by good feeding, which keeps the
animal in vigorous health, and able and willing to clean
itself; insects may be destroyed by thoroughly rubbing
in tobacco-water, or carbolic soap-suds; but ring-
worm requires persistent dressings with mercurial
ointment.

When, owing to any wound or disease in the teat,
blood appears in the milk, the teats should be well
fomented with warm water, milked with gentleness,
and the following ointment applied to them :— Palm
oil 3 ozs., yellow wax 1 oz., acetate of lead 2 drs., alum
1 dr. ; to be well incorporated together, and applied
daily after milking.— Warts on the udder, which are
often a great nuisance, are removable "simply by the
knife or cautery, or ligature when the cow is not m
milk." It must suffice to add here that for some of
these short notices, the value of most of which has been
verified in our own experience, we are indebted to Mr.
W. C. Spooner; and we conclude as we began, by
advising that, except where mere nursing will suffice,
the veterinary surgeon be consulted.

(3.) Milking. On the right performance of this opera-
tion depends a good deal of the produce which it obtains.
It should be effected gently, quickly, and perfectly— the
first because everything that soothes the animal is bene-
ficial, the last both because the milk-secretion is there-
by unchecked, and because the last-drawn milk is much
the richest. The whole subject, however, was so well
treated in a paragraph which appeared some years ago
in the Ayrshire Agriculturist, that we extract it here: —

50

THE DAIRY OF THE PAEM.

" The milking of cows resolves itself naturally into
two heads, viz., how to milk, and when to milk. If
every drop of milk in the cow's udder be not carefully
removed at each milking, the secretion will gradually
diminish in proportion to the quantity each day left
behmd. But another reason why every drop of milk
should be taken away is to be fomid in the well-known
fact that the last milk is doubly as good as the first
milk— hence, if not removed, there is not merely equal,
but double loss. Milking should be conducted with
skill and tenderness— all chucking or plucking at the
teats should be avoided. A gentle and expert milker
will not only clear the udder with greater ease than a
rough and inexperienced person, but will do so with far
more comfort to the cow, who will stand pleased and
quiet, placidly chewing the cud, and testifying by her
manner and attitude that she experiences pleasure rather
than annoyance from the operation. Cows will not yield
their milk to a person they dislike or dread. The ordinary
practice is to milk cows twice daily— at about five o'clock
in the morning, or in Avinter as soon after daylight as
possible, and again at the same hour in the afternoon, thus
leaving twelve ho'-s' interval between each milking."

It should be added that cleanhness in milking should
be observed— the hands should be clean and the udder
too. In practice, milkers neither wash their hands nor
the udder of the cow, but a good milker— that is, one
who does not wet his hands with the milk when milk-
ing—will milk a dry udder without dirtying the milk,
even though the udder be not perfectly clean. In large
dairies milking lasts about an hour each time, and ten
to twelve cows are allotted to each man or woman.

TREATMENT OF THE CALF.

51

The Treatment of the Calf, when intended for veal
or for beef, has been akeady discussed to some extent.*
When the heifer calf is reared for dairy purposes, less
forcing food is required and even desirable. Ample
exercise, too, is necessary. The rules to be observed
are to give the milk, whether it be new or skimmed, of
the natural temperature, to be obtained by warming a
portion of it before mixing with the rest, and perfectly
sweet ; to take care that calves are brought into shelter
at night, at least till June and again after September,
and to keep them together in a field. After a few days
they are fed from the pail, by getting them to suck the
fingers under the surface of the milk ; giving them at
first two quarts a-piece in the morning, and two quarts
a-piece at night ; and it is well to tie them up for the
purpose, and to let them remain tied up for twenty
minutes or more after being fed, else they take to
sucking and plaguing one another. A little hay in a
network bag is hung here and there in the calves'
house, that they may learn to suck and eat it. During
the first winter, a little hay chaff is given, mixed with
pulped mangel or swedes and a little linseed cake.
The ensuing summer is spent in second year's clover,
grass, or old sainfoin as pasture, and in the case of the
more precocious breeds the heifers are often put to the
bull at sixteen months old. They are fed during their
second winter on a full allowance of roots and straw,
with a little good hay and cake in addition. To keep
up a herd of dairy cows, about one-fifth their number
of heifer calves must be reared each year ; these are

* See " Handbook of the Live Stock of the Farm."— (Vinton & Co.)

E 2

52

THE DAIEY OF THE FARM.

almost invariably selected from the calves of the herd,
the remainder being sold as soon as possible after birth.
If, however, it be desired to rear heifer calves for sale
as young cows, it is good policy to pm'chase them from
the best herds, even though £3 a-piece is paid for what
elsewhere would not cost one-half as much. Taking
them in succession, a couple at a time,, several calves
may very well be reared in the course of the season
on the milk of a single good cow, with the assistance
of hay and linseed cake. It is well to leave the calf
with its mother for a week or two in the case of
young cows; they are better milked by their young;
and if carefully stripped in addition at least once a
day by hand, are likely to yield more milk, and to
yield it more easily in the future than if the calves
be taken away early, as they may from older cows.

Some breeders who rear by hand, wean the calves
at birth, and give new milk for ten to fourteen days ;
after which skim milk is introduced, until, by the aid
of boiled linseed, new milk is altogether knocked off.
We have also seen excellent results obtained by giving
older calves curdled skim milk, as much as they will
take twice daily. Indeed, they may be prepared for
the butcher tipon this food, to which they easily become
accustomed, and of which they will consume a large
quantity.

CHAPTER IV.

MILK.

Composition— The Dairy— The Taste of Milk— Adulteration.

The Composition of Milk. — Milk is essentially an
emulsion of fatty matters in water containing albumin,
casein, and sugar in solution, together with a small
quantity of mineral matter. Its fat is suspended
within it in the form of globules, varying from iTtroth
to i^^-iroth part of an inch in diameter, averaging about
vrsooth of an inch. If the milk be kept at rest, these
globules will rise to its surface, and with a portion of
the milk form a coating of cream which, being violently
agitated, separates into butter and " butter- milk," the
latter containing the same constituents as milk itself,
although in different proportions. The composition of
milk, in so far as these buttery globules are concerned,
is ascertained in various ways. The lactometer is
intended to show the specific gravity of millv, and con-
sequently its pm-ity. Pure milk varies between 10*28
and 10-33 at 60° Fahr., so that if watered or skimmed
its density becomes lighter or heavier. As, however, its
density may be maintained at its normal figure by both
skimming and watering, it is evident that vrithout con-
currently testing a sample for cream in what is termed
a creamometer, the lactometer is not reliable ; it does
not indicate the percentage of fat. For this purpose
there is no simpler plan than that known as the
Marchand system, in which a measured quantity of
milk is mixed and well shaken with ether, and sub-j

54

THE DAIRY OP THE FARM.

sequently with alcohol, in a glass tube, and plunged in
a hot-water bath at 104° Fahr., when the fatty solution
rising to the surface indicates the percentage of fat
present. Soxhlet's aerometer, a more delicate process,
IS still more precise ; whereas the lactocrit, of Laval,'
and the control apparatus, of Fjord, are both excellent
for use in connection with the Swedish and Danish
separators. Tests depending upon the opacity of milk
are less rehable, and are now seldom adopted. The
actual composition of milk can only be ascertained by
analysis, but the chui-n will always roughly indicate
the quantity of fat present in milk, and cheese rennet
will remove the remaining curd.

The liquid remaining after the manufacture of cheese
18 called whey. It contains the bulk of the sugar which
was present in the original milk, together with small
quantities of fat, casein, and mineral matter.

The milk of different animals varies in composition,
as will be plain from the following table :—

Ingredients

ID

100 parts.

Composition op Milk.

"Woman.

Cow.

Ass.

Goat.

Ewe.

Mare.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

S.

Albmninoids
Fat

Ash

Total

1-54

4- 37

5- 75
0-53

87-81

2-9

2- 3

3- 8

91-00

3-40

3- 40

4- 80
0-75

87-65

3-70

3- 60

4- 75
0-70

87-25

2-22
1-64
5-99
0-51
89-64

4- 08
3-32

5- 28
0-58

86-80

6-31
6-83
4-73
81-31
0-82

1-95
1-06
6-29
0-39
90-31

100-00

100-00

100-00

100-00

100-00 100-00

100-00

100-00

The term albuminoids includes casein and albumin.
Of these analyses. No. 1 is by Dr. Lyon Playfair ; 2 is

MILK.

55

the average of two analyses by Haidlen ; 3 is by Fleisch-
man ; 4 is the mean of a number of analyses , 5, 7, and
8 are the averages of many analyses published by the
New York Dairy Commission.

As regards the milk of the cow, it differs in composi-
tion, as has been already said, according to the breed,
age, and food of the animal. Thus, the first-drawn
milk produced during the labour and excitement of par-
turition contains an extraordinary quantity of casein, and
is otherwise different from ordinary milk ; it is no doubt
naturally beneficial to the calf in the first day or two of
its life, during which time the milk not used by it and
drawn from the cow is generally rejected for any pur-
pose but the feeding of pigs. The milk of a cow in-
creases in quality as she approaches the period for
drying off ; thus a cow calving in March yields milk of
much superior quality in September. Again, the milk
first drawn from the cow is much poorer than that last
drawn, for whereas the first glass may contain only
5 per cent, of cream, the last glass may contain 20 or
even 25 per cent., unless the hours of milking are kept
twelve hours apart, or approximately so. The milk of the
evening is generally richer than that of the morning.

The following table gives the results of numerous
analyses of ordinary cow's milk : —

Fat.

Soli'ls not
Fiit.

Total
Soliils.

Shorthorn (88 cows) . . .

... 3-71

916

12-87

Jersey (75 cows)

... 4-04

1000

1404

Guernsey (35 cows) ...

... 4-65

9-44

14-09

Red Poll

... 4.-08

8-82

12-90

Ayrshire

... 4-22

8-90

13-12

Dexter Kerry

... 4-99

8-94

13-93

The foregoing are the results of nine years' milking

56

THE DAIRY OF THE FARM.

trials of the British Dairy Farmers' Association, at
Islington.

These tahles, together with the intimation that
casein, the essential matter of cheese, is soluble in
alkaline solutions, as in milk— that the butter of milk
is a compound of several fatty matters of different com-
positions, and produced in various proportions, in
accordance with the food consumed and the tempera-
ture of the period— that the sugar of milk is capable of
transformation by the mere rearrangement of its
elements into a substance having acid properties, and
therefore called lactic acid — that this rearrangement is
effected by the presence of a ferment, itself the active
agent of decomposition — that, in fact, any substance in
contact with it, undergoing chemical transformation
and decomposition, and air carrying filthy odours, the
product of such decomposition, are sufficient to destroy
its purity — that the curd of milk itself, in the presence
of warm air, undergoes such chemical transformations,
must for the present suffice on the subject of the com-
position of milk.

The preservation of milk in its natural composition,
and therefore in its sweetness, may be effected by heat-
ing it in hermetically closed bottles or metallic vessels
up to the boiling-point. This sweetness, however, may
be prolonged even when exposed, by the use of chemical
preparations, some of which are employed by retailers
during very hot weather, but the custom is believed to
be pernicious, and cannot be recommended.

Condensed milk — that is, milk which has been sub-
jected to evaporation so that more than one-half its
water is dissipated, and the whole reduced to a thickened

MILK.

57

tenacious mass — is now largely manufactured, and is
especially serviceable for use on shipboard, as it will
keep fresh for months. It usually contains a large per-
centage of cane sugar.

For the period during which milk is kept for the
natural rising of its cream, its sweetness is maintained
simply by keeping it cool in perfectly clean vessels and
pure dry air. It is in this way that chemical changes
are held in check. If the dairy is warm, the milk will
coagulate before the cream has all risen. If it is cold,
the cream will rise too slowly.

The Dairy. — In order to keep milk sweet, and for the
proper management of the processes which its manu-
factured products undergo, certain rooms must be set
apart expressly for the purpose. The milk-room should
be cool, for the reasons just stated ; and a somewhat
sunken floor, a shaded or thatched roof, and an aspect
to the north and east, are therefore desirable. Where
the old system is adopted, the vessels to hold the milk
are arranged on slate shelves. The floors are better of
stone, hard tiles, or concrete, than of wood, these
materials being less absorbent, whether of milk, dirt, or
damp, all of which may encourage the presence of fer-
ments. The room should not be contiguous to either
drain or dungheap ; it should not be near any food
store, whether the larder of the house or the feeding-
stalls of the farmery. The air which enters it should,
if possible, be free from the taint which the neighbour-
hood of stock or manure it ore or less produces. The
drier, too, the air is, the better ; and therefore a setting
dairy should be kept clean by keeping out the dirt.

58

THE DAIRY OP ' THE FABM.

rather than by too frequent washing. Practically,
however, the floor and shelves of the milk-room are
kept clean by washing. By strict attention to cleanli-
ness and ventilation, and by as far as possible excluding
a summer temperature, those causes — warmth and
humidity — which tend to encourage the presence of
ferments are excluded or held in check, so that good
butter or cheese can be made.

The Flavour of BSilk may be affected by food given
to the cows, and in its turn communicated to the bu,tter
and the cheese made from it. It sometimes occurs,
when the cows are grazing, and when such disagreeable
plants as wild garlic have been eaten. It is, however,
chiefly noticeable during winter-time, when cows
receive turnips and cabbages in abundance. To some
extent the flavour may be prevented by cooking the
food to which it is owing ; a mash of steamed turnips,
chopped hay, beanmeal, oatmeal, and linseed, will pro-
duce perfectly sweet milk. Among the various devices
adopted for removing ill-flavours from milk we may add
the following. Where turnips are the cause, reduction
in the quantity given ; removal of the crowns in which
the bitter flavour will be found ; the careful removal of
all stale bulbs or tops ; change of food. Sometimes a
little saltpetre is dissolved in water, and a dessert-
spoonful added to every gallon of the milk, or some
fine white sugar may be dropped into each setting-pan.
AVe have also known scalding to 170° or 175° Fahr.
have the desired effect. A pint of boiling water is some-
times added to each gallon of milk in the pail ; this is
well covered with a cloth for half an hour, when the

MILK.

59

milk is strained into the setting-pans. Pulping roots
and mixing the pulp with chaff, and subsec[uently heat-
ing before feeding, clearly assists in the removal of
turnipy flavours.

Adulteration of Milk is confined to the admixture of
water or separated milk. Adulterations of these kinds
are still too commonly practised, as our analysts'
reports and the records of our police-courts abundantly
testify. Under recent legislation all sales of food are
presumed to be under the inspection of qualified
of&cers ; and of milk, as of other articles, analyses are
continually being made when there is reason to suspect
dishonesty, under which any abnormal poverty of milk
is immediately detected. When the quality, either
as regards the percentage of cream or of total solids, is
found to fall beneath a certain very moderate standard,
the seller is liable to a fine by the magistrate. Apart,
however, firom direct addition of water, a very general
cause of the inferiority of milk no doubt exists in the
quality of the food. When grains, roots, and inferior
hay are the main foods given to the cows, the milk is
often poor, altogether apart from adulteration.

The above reference to the inspector and pubUc analyst
reminds us of margarine and the artificial substitute
for cheese, which certainly, however, are no part of
Enghsh dairy husbandry, and cannot, indeed, be sold
as dairy produce without a breach of the law, although
it is constantly evaded. We do not propose to
describe the processes by which the offal fat of the

60

THE DAIBY OF THE FAEM.

Chicago stockyards is made up into a food resembling
butter, for which it is, unfortunately, too often sold, and
known as margarine; or by which milk, deprived of
its cream, and re-enriched by the addition of question-
able fatty matters, is made to produce an artificial
cheese. These manufactured articles are, however,
when cleanly made, perfectly wholesome foods; and
margarine especially, which is now made in England,
is also largely imported, and is being more and more con-
sumed in this and other countries. The admixture of
margarine with butter in certain proportions and under
certain conditions enables unscrupulous traders to
commit a fraud which is beUeved to be very extensively
and successfully carried on, for the simple reason that
there is no certain method of detection. Under
present conditions the butter trade between the British
farmer and the consumer is crippled, and this state of
affairs is chiefly owing to the facility with which
foreigners can place spurious manufactures upon our
markets, and to the persistent manner in which the
necessity for agricultural legislation is ignored.

CHAPTER V.

BUTTER.

Composition-Cream-Churning— Implements for the Butter Dairy.

The Composition of Butter varies somewhat with the
method of its manufacture. If made from whole milk
or from scalded cream, it contains more casein than
when made from cream in the ordinary way. This is
an important matter, not only as affecting its flavour,
but also its keeping properties, for it is to the presence
of casein that the tendency of butter to decay is chiefly
owing. But the composition of butter also varies to
some extent with the circumstances of its manufacture.
It consists of a mixture of fatty acids in combination
with glycerine, and it is largely on the feeding of the
cows, and the temperature of the air, that the pro-
portion of these several fats present in the butter, and
its consequent firmness or softness, depend. The

Ingredients, per cent.

Composition of Butter.

Bell.

Pure Fats . . . •

Ash .....

1

90-27
1-15
7-55
1-03

62 THE DAIRY OF THE PAEM.

Good butter should not contain more than 10 per
cent, of water and O'? per cent, of curd, but fault cannot
be found if the former does not exceed 12 per cent, and
the latter 1 per cent. As the keeping qualities of butter,
together with its purity, depend ahnost entirely upon
the presence of water and curd, advances have yet to be
made even m the many dairy schools which are doing
such good work in the country districts. The rancid
flavour of bad or stale butter is believed to be owing to
the decomposition of the glycerides of the fatty acids
which IS favoured by water, but checked for a time by
salt or borax. The presence of bacteria, light, and air
all influence the changes in butter, but it is probable
that the decomposition of the curdy matter present in
butter is the first cause of the mischief which follows
The fatty acids are butyric, caproic, capryhc, and capric,
known as the soluble fatty acids, inasmuch as they are
to some extent, soluble in water; and palmitic, stearic
oleic, and myristic, or insoluble fatty acids, as they are
not soluble m hot water, although soluble in alcohol
Oleic acid forms by far the largest portion of the fat ot
butter, but it is to the group of soluble fatty acids
to which we must look for the flavoming of good butter
These are present to the extent only of some 5 to 7 per
cent., whereas in margarine they form little, if any
more than 1 per cent, of the whole. Butter is perfectly
granular when it has been well made, and under the
microscope presents a field of minute and quite distinct
globules but little varying in size.

Cream, whether obtained by skimming milk after its
ascension or extracted by centrifugal force, varies in
accordance with the richness of the whole fluid and with

BUTTER.

63

the manner in which it has been removed. Neither the
quantity nor the quahty of cream is a reliable guide to
the quality of milk. When raised in cold water or cold
air, its volume may be considerable and its quahty poor ;
whereas cream raised from the same milk at a high tem-
perature would be smaUer in volume and much thicker
and richer. Indeed, a thin poor cream may become
thick if allowed to stand at h-om 60° Fahr. until lactic
acid has sufficiently developed to cause it to coagulate.
The common plan is to set milk in shallow vessels in a
cool dairy at as near 60° Fahr. as possible until the cream
has all risen. This plan is now becoming old-fashioned
and it is not economical, inasmuch as it being impossible
to regulate the temperature of an ordinary dairy, the
milk becomes som- in hot weather before the cream has
all risen, whereas in very cold weather the cream never
all rises. The common practice in Normandy is to set
the milk in deep conical vessels or " terrines " made of
earthenware. The cold systems include the " Cooley,"
in which the milk is placed in deep cylindrical metal
vessels provided with loose lids, which are plunged
under water in a refrigerator-hke box, the skim milk
being subsequently drawn from under the cream, which,
large in quantity but thin, is obtained in ten to twelve
hours ; the Swartz, which is chiefly adopted m Sweden and
Norwiy, where deep, oval-shaped metal vessels without
lids are filled with warm milk and placed in tanks of
iced water , and the Jersey and alUed systems, in which
the milk is set warm in rectangular jacketed metal
vessels, through which cold water is regularly flowing.
These 'systems all have their merits. Some are not
adapted to British dairies where ice cannot be provided,

64

THE DAIRY OF THE I'ABM.

or where the water contains too much heat in summer,
whereas all are being gradually given up in favour of
the separator, which must ultimately supersede every
other medium now that a boy or girl can remove the
cream from the milk of 50 cows at an average expense
of one hour morning and evening, and without the
necessity of a dairy at all. When, at the Danish power
separator trials in 1883, we suggested the hand separator,
the idea was looked upon as impossible. There are
now at least twenty different makes in the market.

There is a general opinion that if a quart of cream
makes a pound of butter the result is quite satisfactory;
but it depends entirely upon the quantity of milk from
which the cream was removed. The cream from the
separator is usually taken thin for butter-making. If
the cream is to be sold for consumption as cream, it is
skimmed much thicker ; indeed, it may have been again
separated, in order to make it as thick as possible. The
correct method of estimating the butter value of milk
is to ascertain and regularly record the quantity of
butter obtained from a given quantity of milk. The milk
of a mixed herd, well fed, should yield 1 lb. of butter per 27
to 28 lbs. of milk on the average of the year ; where the
separator is used, and skilled hands employed, a high-
class Jersey or Guernsey herd may yield 1 lb. of butter
per 20 lbs. of milk, or even less. Under the old system,
35 lbs., and even 40 lbs., are often required. The
leakages are usually found in the imperfect skimming
of the milk, the want of ripeness of the cream, and
careless churning. We have estimated that where all
these mistakes are made the loss may be 25 per cent.,
representing a loss of 60 lbs. of butter in a large Short-

BUTTBE.

65

horn, or 1,200 lbs. in a herd of twenty similar animals
per annum.

Under the old shallow system of setting, the milk is
poured through a hair sieve or cloth strainer, for the
removal of hair or dirt, into vessels, in which it stands
some four inches deep ; after standing for 12 hours in
summer, or 24 hours in winter, it is skimmed with a
thin and almost flat metal skimmer, perforated. It is
skimmed a second time in the same way after another
12 hours, and often even a third and fourth time, so long
as cream can be obtained. In specially-made creamers
the milk is drawn off beneath through a plug, or through
a syphon if the vessel be of glass or provided with a
glass gauge.

Before the introduction of the separator the greatest
quantity of milk in this country was set for cream in
leaden cisterns about 4 inches deep, and brown earthen-
ware pans white inside, some 21 inches across the top, 4
inches deep or thereabouts, and a foot or more wide at
the bottom. Vessels of tinned iron of similar shape were
also and still are commonly used for the purpose.
Under ordinary management each day's skimming, or,
rather, the cream separated at each operation, at what-
ever interval it be taken, is commonly placed in the
cream-crock, a vessel which may be of earthenware or
tin. Upon each addition to the store in this vessel,
and, indeed, the oftener the better, the whole is mixed
up together by means of a wooden stick kept for the
purpose, the object being to promote uniform ripeness.

In Devonshire the milk is set for cream in metal
pans of more than ordinary depth; and after from
twelve to twenty-four hours, according to the season,

66

THE BAIRT OF THE FARM.

these are placed upon a furnace, and the contents
scalded by heating up to 170° or 175° F., after which
they stand till the milk is cool ; then the cream is
removed with a skimmer in the iisual way. It is kept
in the cream-crock until it is ready, when butter is
easily made from it either by churning or " flapping "
with the hand in a tub for about ten minutes or less.
The latter plan, however, cannot be recommended ; it
is not only slovenly and imperfect, but uncleanly. The
hand of the dairymaid should never come into contact
with either cream or butter.

We now come to the separator, which has thoroughly
revolutionised modern dairying. It has unfortunately
proved a valuable aid to the makers of inferior produce,
for it enables the cheesemaker and the condensed-milk
manufacturer to remove a portion of the cream from
the milk they handle with ease and rapidity. The
separators in the market practically work upon one
system : the milk passing through them is subjected to
centrifugal force, hence the lighter portion — the cream
— is separated from the heavier portion — the skim milk,
as it used to be called. By more or less ingenious
arrangements, the thiclmess of the cream can be
regulated ; in other words, more or less of the skim
milk is permitted to pass off with it. There are hand-
machines, which will separate 60 gallons, and power-
machines, which will separate 350 gallons per hour,
removing 97 to 98 per cent, of the butter fat present in
the milk. These machines vary in speed, their drums
revolving from 4,000 to 7,500 times per minute. The
cream, extracted at a high temperature (usually 75°
to 95° F.), is generally skimmed at the rate of 15 to 20

BUTTEE.

67

per cent. The separator adds rapidity to efficiency of
workmanship, a truly economical arrangement, and, at
the same time, it provides a perfectly fresh, sweet
skim milk for household use. Dairy machinery is,
however, still undergoing a process ol evolution. A
milking-machine has been invented and even used in
daily farm practice (it is the joint patent of Messrs.
Gray and Nicholson), while the separator has developed
into a combined cream-extractor and butter-maker.
Although both machines have to be simpHfied
before the pubhc will " take hold " of them, it is yet
possible to produce butter direct from the cow, and
this will probably be the fin de siecle climax, if we
are not mistaken in the wonderful man whose intellect
has almost encompassed the globe with separators
which bear the name of Dr. de Laval. The best-known
machines of other makers are the Danish of Burmeister
and Wain, the Victoria of Watson and Laidlaw, the
Alexandra, the Pesca, and the Lefeldt. In a butter
dairy where the separator is used very few instructions
are necessary. The cream is handled as in other cases,
but the skim milk, if it is necessary to keep it sweet
for sale in summer, may be heated up to 170° P. as
it comes out of the machine, and then cooled dovra
as low as possible by passing over a refrigerator.

In raising cream by the various setting methods,
the milk should be carried to the dairy as warm as
possible from the cows, and at once strained into the
pans or creamers, which should be kept at as low a
temperature as possible (above 40° F.), whether by
the aid of cold air, ice, or water. When milk is
subjected to a rapidly falling temperature, as, for

p 2

68

THE DAIET OF THE FARM.

example, when it is set at 90° F. in a dairy or a
cold creamer at 45° F., the cream rises with great
rapidity. The reason is chiefly owing to the fact that
fat, which forms the bulk of cream, has a lower specific
gravity than the remainder of the milk. The difference
in what we may call the normal specific gravity of
the two materials is, however, widened under the
conditions presented by a falling temperature ; for the
fat, not being so good a conductor of heat as the
remainder of the milk, does not feel the change in
the temperature so quickly, hence it rises more
rapidly. Briefly, when subjected to a falling tempera-
ture, as suggested above, the fat of milk is lighter, as
compared with the milk, than it is under other
conditions.

When the shallow system of setting is adopted,
the temperature of the dairy or setting-room should
not be higher than 55° F., nor lower than 40° F.
The choicest butters are made from the first cream
skimmed, but excellent butter can be made even
when the last possible cream is taken.

Eipened (acid) cream makes more butter than sweet
cream ; and if perfectly sweet cream is mixed with
ripened cream and churned immediately, the whole of
the butter will not be extracted. Sweet cream is not
ripened by the mere fact of its being mixed with
ripened cream ; time must be allowed. The mixing of
the cream of each skimming greatly facilitates the even
ripening of the bulk. Cream should not be churned
until twelve hours after the last skimming. It should
always be kept in dry air, and, where churning is
regular, at about 60° F. Twelve hours before churning.

BUTTEE.

69

the temperature of the cream should be gradually
raised or decreased, as the case may be, with the object
of bringing it to the temperature necessary for churning
— 56° to 58° in summer, to 62° or 64° F. in winter, varying
with the temperature of the air. The cream should
always be strained into the churn.

Churns are of various types. The necessary points
are strength — as well of the metal fittings as of the wood ;
a mouth large enough for both hands to enter; the
entire absence of fixed beaters or dashers. Churning,
which should be more rapid in winter when the cream
is apt to fall in temperature, and when chm^ning is
consequently prolonged, sometimes with bad results —
should begin slowly, the speed gradually increasing.
It is unnecessary to adopt a particular speed. Much
depends upon the quantity of cream to be churned.
The smaller the quantity, the more rapidly is the butter
produced. The churn should, however, never be much
more than half full. The longer the time occupied in
churning up to a certain point, the higher the tem-
perature rises, unless in very cold weather, when, the
dairy being much colder than the cream, the latter is
reduced if the process continues too long. The only
danger of fast churning is over-churning and bringing
the butter into a lump. Churning should cease im-
mediately the butter granules have first formed, when
a little cold water should be added. The churn may
then be turned slowly until the butter has gathered
into granules about the size of hemp-seed. It is then
ready for washing. The butter-milk is first drawn off,
cold water is then added, and the churn rocked several
times, until finally the water last drawn off is quite

70

THE DAIRY OP THE FAEM.

clear. Brine is then made— the salt being in solution
—and poured on to the butter, where it may remain half
an hour. When this is drawn off the butter is removed
with, a scoop, and worked on the table or butter-
worker until the moisture has been removed as far as
is possible. The butter may then be made up for sale
or table. If, however, there are means, it should be
cooled and hardened, when it will make up much
better.

When butter is dry salted, the salt should be ground
and dried, and sprinkled over the butter on the worker
by the aid of a dredger, at the rate of half an ounce to
the pound if mild salting is required, or three-quarters
of an ounce if it is for keeping. No larger quantity of
salt is necessary under any conditions.

A few other points may be noted. The churn should
be ventilated two or three times during churning. The
ear and the eye should watch for the butter coming, in
order to select the right moment to stop. A change
will be heard in the sound of the cream, and minute
grains will appear on the glass, which will simultaneously
become clear of cream. Hot water should never be
poured into cream, nor should cream be suddenly cooled
or heated more than 3° or 4° F. just before churning.
The churn, the worker, and all the utensils are pre-
pared for use by scrubbing with hot water, followed
by cold, and, excepting the churn, by a rubbing with
salt.

Among the implements required in addition to the
churn are a butter-worker, rectangular in a small dairy,
circular in a large one ; a few strong pails, pairs of
slicers, Scotch hands and butter scoops, cloth strainer,

BTJTTEE.

71

scales and weights, a maldng-iap board of seasoned wood,
and a correct thermometer.

In potting butter for fm-ther use it is even more
essential to remove every possible particle of curdy
matter and moisture than under other conditions. The
butter should be made in the cool of the early mornmg,
or late at night if in summer or autumn. A glazed
earthenware vessel should be used, and the inner surface
covered with layers of butter as gradually as it is filled.
The chief object is to keep out the air, so that by plenty
of pressure no interstices are formed. When filled, a
fine piece of muslin may be laid over the surface, and
upon this a thick layer of salt, or the vessel may be
filled up with thick brine.

Whole milk is sometimes churned. In this case the
milk is kept at 60° to 65° until it has absolutely thickened
or " lappered," when it yields a much larger percentage
of butter than could possibly be obtained if it were
churned sweet. The system, however, except where the
sour butter-milk sells, is almost entirely a thing of the
past.

CHAPTER VI.

CHEESE.

Composition — Curd — Various Cheeses : Gloucester, Cheshire, Dunlop,
Cheddar, Derbyshire, Lancashire, Stilton — Utensils of the Cheese

Dairy.

The Composition of Cheese depends, of course, upon
the mode of its manufacture. The following analj^ses
may be accepted as trustworthy ; they represent average
qualities of the several cheeses named, except in a few
special cases.

Analyses op Cheese.

Water.

Fat.

Casein, etc.

Sugar.

Ash.

Cheddar (Lloyd) ixnder

six months ...

35-SS

30-94

29-26

3-92

English and American

average
Cheshire (new)

34-38

32-71

26-38

3-58

36-96

29-34

24-08

5-17

4-45

Do. (old)

32-59

26-06

32-51

4-53

4-31

Stilton, average

30-35

35-39

28-85

3-82

Derby

31-68

35-20

24-50

4-38

4-24

Cream (Isfc prize Dairy

Show)

33-5

58-3

8-2

Gorgonzola, average...

44-04

29-84

28-06

3-87

Parmesan, average ...

31-34

19-22

41-99

6-25

Gruy^re, average

34-87

28-91

25-87

3-84

Roquefort, average ...

31-20

3316

27-63

6-01

Camembert (1st prize

Dairy Show)

40-30

29-9

29-8

Edam, Dutch

36-28

30-26

24-06

4-90

Gouda, Dutch. . .

21-90

24-81

46-95

6-32

CHEESE.

75

The quantity of fat present, to which the richness of
the cheese is due, depends, first, on the quahty of the
milk; next, on the cream being all retained; and lastly,
on the process of manufacture being conducted so care-
fully that no fat is allowed to escape with the whey.

Milk is converted into curd by the aid of rennet and
heat. Eennet is a preparation, obtainable in hquid,
powder, and tablet form, from the stomach of the suck-
ing calf. Formerly it was customary for cheese-makers
to prepare their own rennet, but the practice is rapidly
djdng out, most of the brands now manufactured being
much superior as regards purity, strength, and evenness
of quality — all very important considerations. The action
of rennet is quicker the nearer the milk approximates
to blood heat — indeed, assuming that it is never set
above 95°, in British cheese-making at least, the
length of time it occupies in producing curd is in an
inverse ratio to the temperature at which the milk is
set. Thus at a high temperatm'e, such as 90° E., a
much smaller quantity of rennet is necessary to convert
a given quantity of milk into cm'd in a given time,
than at a low temperature, such as 70° F. Again, the
time occupied by the milk in coagulation is in an inverse
ratio to the quantity of rennet used ; for, if 20 cubic
centimetres of rennet are required to produce curd from
20 gallons of milk at a given temperature in one hour,
ten cubic centimetres only will be required to bring the
curd under similar conditions in two hours.

In the production of curd, the maker has to remember
that there are four conditions to be considered — the
quantity of milk, the quality of the milk, the tempera-
ture at which it is set, and the time to be occupied in

7-i THE DAIRY OV THE EAEM.

bringing the curd. The temperature of the dairy has
also to be considered, for the same milk will occupy a
longer period in coagulation upon a cold day ; and in this
chmate of ours we must prepare for considerable varia-
tions if our produce is to be of high quality. For this
reason some makers raise the temperature of the milk
one or two degrees when the temperature of the air falls.
Milk should always be set in vessels whicli will retain the
heat, and for small cheeses none are better than oak
tubs with close-fitting hds. The rennet used should be
carefully kept in a cold, dark cupboard, and the bottle
well corked. Eennet which smells objectionably should
never be used, even though it be new and "home-made,"
for bad rennet is the father of disease in cheese. In a
cheese dairy makers run great risks where the cows are
fed upon questionable foods ; where they are not care-
fully cleaned, littered, and provided with clean quarters;
where the milkers milk with dirty hands, and dip their
fingers in the pails ; where the milk is exposed in the
cowhouse for any length of time, or where dirty pails,
strainers, and utensils are used. An invisible germ may
communicate disease to a huge hundred-pound cheddar,
and destroy not only its value, but its maker's reputation.

The leading system of British cheese-making is that
knovra as the Cheddar process, which produces a mild,
mellow cheese of nutty flavour. There are several
variations of this system, and under each cheese of fine
quality is produced, not only in this country but in
America and in New Zealand. In Somerset the romid
vat is used, but in Scotland and in America the
rectangular vat is preferred, this being provided with a
jacket by means of which the milk can be cooled or

CHEESE. ' 75

i?

heated. If the night's milk is cooled, very little cream
rises ; if it is not, a large quantity of cream will rise,
and this must be removed and mixed with a still larger
quantity of milk. This milk is then heated to such a
degree as will suffice to bring the mixed evening's and
morning's milk to the temperature at which it is
decided to add the rennet. This temperature varies
between 80° and 85° F., and similarly the time in which
the curd is brought for cutting varies between 40
minutes and 60 minutes. Some makers add stale whey
to the milk before the rennet is pom'ed in, with the
object of imparting to it a riper condition; others
induce that ripeness by subsequently scalding to a
higher temperature. If, however, the milk of the
previous evening has been maintained as high as 70°
F. during the night, it will usually be found ripe
enough. When the curd is firm enough to cut, the
knife is introduced, and it is divided with extreme care
into very fine cubes. When the whey has risen and
covered it, stirring commences with the breaker, this
being continued from 35 minutes to 45 minutes, when
the curd is left to settle at the bottom of the vat.
Sometimes the mass is gradually heated by the intro-
duction of steam or hot water in the jacketed vats
while stirring proceeds; by this means the whey is
easily expelled from the curd, which soon assumes the
small, fine, even and shotty appearance so essential to
success. In Somerset, scalding succeeds breaking down ;
a quantity of whey being removed fi'om the vat is
heated and returned to the mass, which is brought to a
temperature of from 88° to 90° F. Stirring is then
continued for from 15 to 20 minutes, when the cm-d is

76

THE DAIRY OF THE FARM.

again allowed to settle, and a second scalding takes
place, the mass being heated with whey to from 90° to
94° F., or where one scald only is given, as high in some
cases as 100° F. in the autumn, a season when the
maximum temperature is required. The mass is now
stirred again from 15 to 30 minutes, then left to
settle, when the curd is tested, with the object of
ascertaining whether sufficient acid has been developed.
If the curd is acid enough, the whey is drawn off; the
curd is then evenly piled, turned, cut twice, or even three
times, into cubes of six to eight inches square, and kept
warm between each operation. If the curd ripens
slowly, longer time must be given between each cutting
or turning. It must be mellow and distinctly acid
before it is ready to grind, a condition which can hardly
be described, but which can be perfectly demonstrated
in practice. After grinding it is thoroughly mixed
with fine dry salt at the rate of 2 J per cent., and then
packed into the cheese mould or vat and put to press.
Pressing, during which the cloths are daily changed
and the cheese turned, lasts three days ; after which
the cheese is trimmed, bandaged, and taken to the
ripening-room, which should be maintained at from
64° to 70° F., the room for advanced cheese beinc^
five degrees lower. It was formerly assumed that
Cheddar cheese could only be made in a certain favoured
district, but the idea has long been exploded, and no
educated cheese-maker now entertains it for a moment.
As a matter of fact, there is no variety of cheese manu-
factured in a temperate chmate which cannot be made
wherever good milk can be produced and a suitable
dairy provided.

CHEESE.

77

With the exception of a few of the most perfectly-
constructed dairies in the so\ith-west of Scotland, no
cheese dairies in Great Britain, nor, indeed, in Europe—
this we can say with safety— approach in completeness
those which are found on the best estates in Cheshire,
the county in which Cheshire cheese is the chief pro-
duct of the soil. In many respects the system of
manufacture of Cheshire is identical with that adapted
in making Cheddar cheese. The evening's milk is
cooled down to 70° F. in the American vat, and on the
following morning the cream is skimmed off, mixed
with milk, and returned. The morning's milk is
added, and the whole heated to from 84° to 90° F.,
according to the practice of the dairy. The coloming
matter, annatto, where coloured cheese is made, is then
added, and well stirred in when the milk is ready for
the rennet. Stirring is continued from fifteen to
twenty minutes, after which the vat is covered up until
the curd has set and is ready to cut. After cutting-
horizontal and vertical multiple bladed knives being
used— heat is turned on and breaking down is com-
menced and continued until the curd is fine and firm.
It is then allowed to settle, and is subsequently collected
at one end of the vat, the whey being drawn' off at the
other end, passing through two strainers to prevent the
loss of curd. A rack is placed at the bottom of the vat ;
this being covered with a cloth, the curd is piled upon
it to facilitate drainage, then it is cut into cubes,
tm-ned, cut again, subsequently broken up by hand,
piled, cut, and turned again until its condition fits it
for the mill, when it is ground, salted, 2J per cent, of fine
salt being used, and put, while still warm, into the

THE DAIRY OP THE FARM.

mould. It is next placed in a small heated chamber,
Jmown as the cheese oven, after which it goes to press
remammg from three to six days, being turned, and the
cloth changed daily. Its final destination is the ripen-
mg-room, usually an upstairs apartment, where it is
systematically turned, trimmed, and bandaged, where
bandages are used. Like Cheddar, Cheshire cheeses
are of considerable size,, and made of whole milk, the
removal of any portion of the cream seriously affecting
the quahty of the cheese. It is not possible, however
carefully the work is performed, to prevent a small
percentage of the fat of the milk running off in the
whey. This fat is not lost ; it rises in the whey tank
IS skimmed off, and made into butter, so that where the
hera of cows is large the sale of whey butter is con-
siderable. It is probable that, although the separator
might be the means of improving the butter, the whev
being passed through it while fresh, the extra laboui
entailed would result in pecuniary loss. The next best
plan-and this entails no extra cost-is to heat the whev
to 95° or even 100° F., and to allow it to cool quicldy,
and to as near 50° F. as possible ; 40° F. would be better
but this would not be practicable. By this means the
cream rises rapidly, and may be removed before any
change seriously affecting its flavour has taken place
_ In making cheese of this character, the great object
IS to retam the fat, to cut fine, and to grind and salt
when the right moment has arrived, i.e., when sufficient
acidity has been developed ; for upon this depends the
mellowness and flavour of the cheese. As acidity is the
result of the activity of microscopic organisms known
as bacteria, it follows that should the milk or the

CHEESE.

79

rennet be impure, the utensils, the dairy, or the hands
of the maker dirty, organisms foreign to pure milk
may be introduced and the cheese spoiled.

The manufacture of Gloucester and Derby cheese
cannot be said to be either very distinct processes,
or processes which ought to be encouraged. Both
makes are languishing; indeed, some makers do not
hesitate to exhibit cheese made upon the Cheddar
system, but in different moulds, as Gloucester or
Derby. We have frequently listened to the recitals of
the glorious days that are past, when cheese in these
two counties was a specialite — a thing to be remem-
bered. Happily, the speakers possessed no means of
inviting comparison with the cheese of to-day. Certain
it is that, however favourably they might at one time
have compared with other British makes, they can com-
pare no longer ; and it is equally certain that Cheddar
and Cheshire have never been so skilfully made and so
good as they are now. No other varieties but Cheddar,
Cheshire, and Stilton, not even the Leicester cheese, are
recognised at our dairy schools, and it is questionable
whether a single application has ever been made for
instruction in any but these and the soft cheeses.

The Accommodation needed for Cheese - making

varies in different districts. Everywhere, however, the
same instructions as to cleanliness are of course impera-
tive. In Gloucestershire, a room on the north side of
the farmhouse serves for holding the milk, whether set
in pans on shelves for cream, or in the cheese-tub on
the floor for curd. Here, too, are the leaden cisterns in
which the whey stands, a foot deep, for cream, and

80

THE DAIRY OF THE PAEM.

from which, after skimming, it drains away to the pig's
vault. On the north side of this room is a paved shed
in which chiu-ning is done, and in which vessels are
placed to dry ; and at one end of this shed is a wash-
house (with the well close by), with furnace and boiler,
in which milk may be warmed, and where the vessels
are washed. In addition to this, there is a cheese-
room, generally a loft over the dairy; but for hot
summer weather a detached and cool airy place is to be
preferred. Here, on the wooden floor and on wooden
shelves, the cheeses are placed and turned repeatedly,
until ripe for sale.

Stilton Cheese is pecuHar to Leicestershire, although
it can be successfully made wherever good milk can
be produced — where the pecuhar temperature and
h;imidity it requires can be obtained, and where the
maker is possessed of the required skill. Before
attempting the manufacture of this cheese upon an
important scale, the maker should thoroughly master
the principles involved, as nothing is easier than to
produce an article which, when the season for sale
arrives, is practically worthless.

The milk, fresh from the cow and well strained, may
be set for curd at from 82° to 90° F. Which tempera-
ture suits the milk the best will have to be ascer-
tained in practice; a record should, therefore, be kept
for reference when the cheeses are ripe. The patent
rennet will be found superior to that made at home.
When the curd is fit for cutting, it may be removed,
slice by slice — a cream skimmer will do very well for the
purpose — into a cheese cloth spread out to receive it.

CHEESE.

81

The draining-table on which this cloth is laid should
be of cement or metal slightly inclined to the front. The
four edges of the table should be provided with a rim,
and in the front there should be a hole through which
the whey can escape. It therefore resembles a sink,
the outsides of the cloth lying over the edges, and
thus the curd is kept together. When the curd has
become partially solid the four corners of the cloth are
tied together to further express the whey, and this
practice is continued until the curd is removed alto-
gether, broken up, and laid in the cooler to air. Here
it is left awaiting the curd produced from the milk of
the next meal, which is treated exactly the same. On
the afternoon of the second day the two curds are broken
up fine, salted— 2 per cent, of salt being used— and
the moulds filled. These operations must be conducted
in a dairy in which the temperature is controlled
between 56° and 60° F. The young cheese must not,
however, remain here, but be removed to an apartment
in which the temperature is at least five degrees
higher, in order that it may properly drain. Inattention
at this point wiU assuredly spoil the cheese past
recovery. It is now turned daily until it appears firm
enough to stand alone and to maintain its shape, when
the mould is removed. The cheese is then enveloped
in a clean calico bandage, neatly and evenly pinned,
and carried to a separate shelf. It receives a fresh
bandage every day until the coat commences to form,
when it is removed to the drying-room, an apartment
kept at as near 55° F. as possible, the air being dry.
Here it is turned daily until the coat is complete, when
it goes to a moist apartment, five degrees warmer,

a

82

THE DAIRY OP THE FAEM.

i to ripen. Stilton cheese does not realise the prices of

■ olden times ; competition is keener, and dealers know
, it. It is questionable whether, remembering this

■ fact, and the further fact that Stilton loses con-
siderably in weight by the time it is ripe for the
table, it pays the general maker better than first-rate
Cheddar.

Truckles and Wiltshire loaves are merely forms of
Cheddar; indeed, makers have learned that to make
upon any other system is to fail to obtain the best
prices. When fine cheese is made in loaf form it
invariably sells well, as families are accustomed to go
direct to the maker, to whom they pay a better price
than he obtains wholesale.

Leicester cheese is a specialite, and worthy of some
remark, although connoisseurs say that it is not what it
used to be. The writer has had excellent opportunities of
testing samples when acting as a judge at the Leicester-
shire shows, and he is bound to say that the inferior
specimens far outweigh those which possess merit. In
the manufacture of Leicester cheese patent rennet is
the best, but home-made rennet is still used, about a
pint per 80 gallons of milk. The milk is brought to a
temperature of from 76° to 78° F. in summer, but
during the cooler weather of the early and late seasons
80°, and even 82°, is adopted. The curd is not fit to cut
for about Ig- hours, and when well broken down the
whey is dravm off. When the curd is firm enough and
has developed sufficient acid, it is placed in a dry cloth,
very slightly salted, put into the mould, and then sent
to press for 24 hours. It is salted on the outside for
four or five days, and having finally been; well washed

CHEESE.

83

with warm whey it is taken to the drying-room, where
it remains until ripe for sale. ;

Wensleyaale Cheese deserves some notice here, for
when perfect it is one of the best varieties of cheese
produced in these islands. Mellow in the extreme,
rich, finely flavoured and blue moulded, it is scarcely
excelled by Stilton, however well this popular .cheese
may be made. There has hitherto been an entire
want of system among the makers of the beautiful
Yorkshire dale, but since the writer had an opportunity
of seeing the practice followed, and calHng attention
to the subject, action has been taken in the right
direction. Mr. John Benson, the able expert and
manager of the Dairy Institute of the British Dairy
Farmers' Association, has been engaged to make an
investigation and to recommend a system. This he
has done, and it is therefore probable that the 1892
make will be of a uniformly high quality.

Soft Cheese. — A few years ago the soft cheese made
m England was extremely limited in quantity, whereas
the quality, except in a few instances, was of a more
than doubtful character. Since the opening of the
Institute mentioned above, however, a large number
of persons, including many dairy teachers, have been
instructed in the manufacture of several varieties of
soft cheese, which are produced upon a rational and
definite system — a system which the writer was
enabled to introduce — and through this means soft
chepse-making is now being taught in almost all

84

THE DAIEY OF THE FAEM.

parts of England. We describe three of these systems
briefly.

Brie (Enghsh type). — Two tin hoops are required —
one plain, 2 in. deep by 10 in. in diameter ; the other
of similar size, but provided with a rim into which
the first-named fits. Add to this two half-inch boards,
12 in. square (beech is to be preferred), and a pair of
straw mats, also 12 in. square, and the plant for
making one cheese is ready. The milk is set at
82° F. (10 to 12 lbs. will be necessary), the quantity
depending upon the quality of the milk. The curd
is brought in four hours, taken up in thin slices, and
deposited in the mould formed by the two hoops
fixed together, and laid upon the mat and board.
Here it remains until the top hoop can be removed,
when a clean mat, followed by a clean board, is laid
over the top of the cheese, which is then inverted, the
dirty mat and board being removed and cleaned for the
next turning on the following morning. When the
cheese is quite firm, so that the remaining hoop can
be removed, it is salted with very fine dry salt, over the
surface and sides (one side at each of two turnings),
and then left until a very delicate white mould appears
upon the coat. It must, however, be turned each day,
and kept at a temperature of about 60° F. It is then
ready for the table.

The Conlommiers (English type) . — This variety is of
smaller size, the same quantity of milk (10 to 12 lbs.)
making two cheeses. The moulds are 2 in, deep by 5 in.
in diameter, and the mats and boards 13 in. long by 7 in.

CHEESE.

80

-wide. The rennet is added at 78° P., and the curd
brought in eight hours. The after-treatment is the
same as that adopted for Brie.

Mignon or Gervais. — ^This cheese is made of a mix-
tm-e of cream and milk, set at a temperature of 65° F.
Six drops of rennet (Hansens as a standard) are
sufficient for 2|- quarts of rich milk and 1 quart of
cream, equal to the production of one dozen cheeses.
The curd is fit to cut in from six to eight hours, when it -
is removed into a cloth, in which it is allowed to drain
until it is sufficiently sohd and consistent to press.
Eemoved into a clean cloth, it is laid within a wooden
frame with open sides, and pressed with a close-fitting
follower of wood, heavy enough to cause the whey
to drain away without any loss of cream. This
pressure, with one or two manipulations, with the
object of maintaining evenness of consistence, continues
until the curd is as thick as an ice cream, when it is
pressed into the specially-made moulds Hned with pre-
pared paper, both of which are now easily obtainable.
This cheese is not eaten until two or three days after
manufacture. The quantity of cream added may be
varied.

An excellent Skimmed Milk Cheese may be made
upon the system suggested for the Coulommiers, with
this exception, that the temperature of setting for curd
should be reduced to 76° F., the curd being cut in nine
to ten hours.

; Pure Cream Cheese is very easily made. Pure
cream, to which two drops of rennet per quart are

86'

THE DAIEY OP THE FAEM.

acided, is poiired into a damp cheese-cloth, and hung
in a diy dairy at 62° F. to drain. When solid and
consistent it is placed in muslin in a perforated metal
mould — round, square, heart, diamond, or fleur-de-lis
shaped— cdvered with a follower, and pressed with a
small weight until it is quite firm. A few days usually
elapse before it is at its best.

Sage Cheese should be kept twelve months before it
is fit for use. Bruise a quantity of sage in a mortar,
also a little spinach for the sake of the juice, which will
give a green colour, the sage alone not being bright
enough in itself ; these juices, squeezed together through
a cloth and added to about a pailful of milk with a proper
proportion of rennet, will make enough sage curd for
one thick cheese. When the whey is drawn from this
in the usual manner, the curd will be found of a much
deeper colour than might be expected from the pale
green given to the milk. This sage curd should be kept
quite separate from the bulk. When ready for the vats,
having been crumbled into small particles separately,
some of the green cm'd should be mixed with the other
(about one-third is sufficient), either by laying it in
rows or mixing it together in the vat ; care should be
taken that none of the whey drawn from it gets into
that intended for butter, or it will give it the flavour of
the sage. The after-management of this cheese is the
same as that of other thick cheeses.

Utensils for the Cheese Dairy —Besides the ordinary
milking pails, and sieve through which the milk is
poured from them, a deep cheese-tub, to stand on the

CHEESE.

8?:

flpqr of;tlie dairy, in which the curd is set, is required-,. ,
holding three gallons, or thereabouts, for every cow in
the dairy. Tub^ or vats upon wheels are especially
convenient, as they can be removed from one apart-
ment to another. When the milk or the curd requires
a , change of temperature, this plan is often of great
value. A "ladder" is needed to rest across this tub
for carrying the sieve through which the milk is pomed.
Curd breakers, curd knives, strainers, and scoops are
required. A curd mill, costing from 20s. upwards,
being simply a hopper, at the bottom of which is a
galvanised cylinder studded with short radial arms
revolving between corresponding pins fixed in the sides
of the trough, and passing the curd placed in the hopper
in a crumbled state, is also needed. Slate vats or tanks
of sufficient capacity to hold the whey, where it is set
fori crearn, are necessary. Cheese-vats or moulds, in
which the curd is pressed into the form of the future
cheese; and cheese-presses, either direct masses of
stone Ufted by winch and rope and pulley, or lever
presses, are needed. The heaviest of the former
consists of a block of stone of nearly three feet cube,
and weighing 20 to 30 cwt. The latter are of various
forms, and produce, by the action of a small weight,
whatever pressure is desired. They cost about 50s. ; or,
if two together in one frame, about 51., and may be
used to exert a pressure varying from 1 cwt. up to
30 cwt., or even more. We may also name here, as a
recent invention with probably a future, a series of
cheese-shelves arranged in book-case form, i.e., closed
on one side, and slung on two pivots, enabling it to be
swung round, bottom upwards, so that the top

88

THE DAIBY- OP THE FAEM.

of each shelf containing cheese becomes, in its
turn, the floor on which those cheeses rest; and the
whole work of turning a number of cheeses is done
at once. For soft cheese-making a great variety of
small utensils are required, including oak tubs with
lids, curd spoons, moulds of tinned iron, mats, boards,
rennet measuring tubes, a salt box, and dredger.

Insects aflFecting Cheese.— Cheeses are liable to the
attacks of various insects, the principal of which are the
cheese-mite and the cheese-fly, Piophila casei, whose
maggots are the well-known jumper. The cheese-fly,
we may add, is a little greenish-black fly, with yellowish
head and legs. In order to escape its attacks, the
cheeses should be pressed dry, and so made as not to
crack ; they should also be repeatedly wiped with a
flannel cloth, and turned on boards kept clean by
scrubbing and occasional rubbing with fresh oil.

CHAPTEE VII.

GENEBAL MANAGEMENT.

Dairying and Grazing— Profitable Use of Milk— Cropping of a
Dairy Farm.

Dairying or Grazing. — An occupier of grass land has
the choice of several methods of turning it into account.
If it is of good quality he may devote it wholly to the
production of beef; if it is poor, and some arable land is
attached, it may be vi^holly devqted to. the. rearing of
young' stock, every cow bringing up several calves.
"Under ordinary circumstances he may make either
butter or cheese ; he may sell milk, or it may be more
profitable to use the milk in making veaL The nature
of the market for his produce will probably determine
his choice. It is no part of our plan to discuss the
relative merits of grazing and dairying here, but there
is one point of the comparison which ought to be
alluded to, and that is the greater draught made upon
the resources of the land by any system which involves
the annual sale of the milk, either whole or manu-
factured into cheese.

Milk removes some of those constituents of soils on
which their fertility practically depends. As the sole
food of the young, it builds up their bone as well as
their flesh, and among its ash constituents, therefore,
are to be found the mineral constituents of bones;
whereas in the casein, of primary importance in the
production of the muscular or fibrous tissue, nitrogen,
the most costly of all the fertilising property of soils, is

THE DAIET OF THE FARM.

the most important element. One thousand parts of
milk contam about 7 parts of ash or mineral matter •
and his chiefly consists of phosphate of lime and
potash which mclude the three most important mineral
plant foods. The following figiires are taken from
leading English and German authorities.

Among the mineral ingredients of 1,000 lbs. of milk
(aboi:^t 100 gallons) are :—

Phosphoric acid 1-73 jj^g

Magnesia ... Q.jg

Potash
Lime ...

Wol£f. Warington.

2-00 lbs.

0-20

1'50 „ 1-70

1-33 „ 1-70
4"74 „ 5-60

J!^ Z ^ ' "^"k ^ whether

this be sold, or converted into cheese for sale, or set for
cream and made into butter and skim-milk cheese
these products being sold off the farm, a considerable
quantity of mineral matter is removed from its soil

Takmg Mr Warington's figures as our standard," the
OSS of phosphoric acid per 600 gallon cow would be 12
lbs. and of potash 10 lbs. The phosphoric acid in the
cheapest, form of phosphatic artifical manure, basic
slag, IS 17-3 per cent., whereas the potash in kainite is
13-8 per cent. Further, one ton of good mixed dung
contains about 8 lbs. of phosphoric acid and 12 lbs

^^''nnn ' ^^^^ *° "^^^^'^^^ ^^^^ nitrogen

in 1,000 lbs of milk is about 5-9 lbs,, so that the

quantity of dung It would be necessary to purchase to

replace the mtrogeu removed in 600 gallons of milk

would be three tons, the average quantity of nitroc^en

per ton being about 12 lbs. Wherq dairy farm'ers

GENERAL MANAGEMENT.

91

afg accustomed to use purchased cotton or linseed
cake, bean meal, bran, or malt combs in economical
quantities,"no loss of fertilising matter occurs, and
this plan has the advantage that it serves a double
purpose. Where, however, milk selling or cheese-
making is continued for a long series of years without
the introduction of purchased foods or manures, it
undoubtedly tells upon the fertihty of the soil, and is a
loss to which rich grazing grounds, where full-grown
animals are brought simply to be fattened, are not sub-
ject. In illustration of the perpetual dram of phosphates
which the cheese manufacture entails upon the soil,
it may be mentioned here that the dairy pastures of
Cheshire have been wonderfully improved by the addition
of bone-dust as a top-dressing to the land, a manure
which supphes just those ingredients of which the cheese
had deprived it. The loss entailed by -cheese-making is
not so great as where milk is sold, and on a butter-
making farm it is stiU less, unless the skim-milk is sold.

The Most Profitable Use of Milk.-This necessarily
depends altogether on the market. (1) To sell the
whole milk direct to the consumer is often the most
profitable method. One penny a pint is a common
average wholesale price to the cowkeeper, from which
he must deduct the cost of churns and conveyance.
His cows may yield under hberal treatment from 600
to 700 gallons annually, and thus return (gross) from
m to 23Z. annually a-piece, but an average of £20 is
seldom exceeded. (2) To make milk into butter and
skim-milk cheese, may, with a yield of 600 gallons
annually, 'and calculating 20 pints per lb. of butter

92

THE DAIEY.OE' THE FAEII.

and 11 gallon per lb. of skim-milk cheese, yield as
follows : —

600gallonsofmilk = 2401bs. ofbutter, at Is. Id. 13 o 0
500 gallons of skim-milk = 330 lbs. of cheese, at

'"'•P'^^'lb. 4 2 6

Value of wliey and butter-milk ... ... loo

Total annual yield per cow ....£18 2 6

(3) To make milk wholly into cheese may, with a
yield of 600 gallons of milk, result in 5 cwt. of cheese
per annmn— avery unusual produce, however; and this
at 60s. per cwt., a moderate price, results in an annual
produce of £1,5 per cow, to which must be added,
perhaps, 50s. worth of butter and bacon, or £17 10s. in
all. The more common produce, however, upon the
best farms is : —

4 cwt. at 62s. ... ... ^ ^ g

Whey butter ... 9 q

' Whey ..; ;;; ;;; ^

100 gallons of milk sold at M. ... ... 315

0^ ill all .£19 3 per cow.

(4) To use the milk wholly for fatting veal, at the rate
of 10, 16, 20, 24, 27, 30, and 32 gallons in seven succes-
sive weeks, using 160 gallons or thereabouts in that time
for producing about 1 cwt. of veal, will enable each cow
thus to fatten 4 cwt. or more of veal per annum ; and this,
at the price of £i per cwt., would yield £16 annually
per cow. From this, however, must be deducted the
cost of such other foods as the calves consmne, and also
a certain sum at which the risk attending the manage-
ment of young stock must be valued— a risk which
m skilled hands does not accompany the other methods

(jENEBAL " MANAGEIIEXT.

93

of turning milk into money, at all events to anything
like the same extent. It must, however, be remem-
bered that a pecuniary value attaches to the manure of
calves so feci, ^Yhich it is fair to add to the receipts.

It may thus be assumed, after making sundry de-
ductions, that ±-20, £18, £11 10s., and perhaps £16 may
be taken as the produce of well-managed, deep-milkmg
cows, in milk, butter, cheese, and veal respectively ;
the value of the calf, less the milk it has consumed,
30s. or 35s., vrhen a week or ten days old, has to be
added. It will, however, be generally felt that these
figures stand too high for ordinary experience ; and
certainly that which is true of well-managed individual
herds is not necessarily true of all, however perfect the
management may be. In illustration of this, two facts
may be mentioned, one of which entirely corroborates
our estimate ; but the other, the more trustworthy of the
two, considerably discounts it :— (1) The dairy statistics
of 15 farms in Gloucestershire prove that in the year
of their collection, 489 cows produced 1,604 cwt. of
cheese, 5,268 lbs. of milk-butter, 11,420 lbs. of whey-
butter, besides a sale of 354 calves and 1,756 score
lbs. of bacon. The total sales at present prices would
probably stand thus : —

1,604 cwt. of clieese, at 60s.
5,268 lbs. of bvitter, at Is. Id. . .
11,420 lbs. of wliey-butter, at lOJ

354 calves, at 30s

1,756 scores of bacon, at lis. 6d.

£ s. d.

4,812 0 0

285 7 0

475 16 8

531 0 0

1,009 14 0

439 cows produced

^7,113 17 8

This was equal to nearly £16 4s. per cow, corresponding

: '94 THE BAIET OP THE PAEM.

very nearly to the figures suggested as the probable
rnoney produce of cheese-making. (2) The other fact is
that m many other large dairy districts it is common
for the farmers to let their cows for the year to the
dairyman agreeing .to set apart particular pastures for
them and to give them certain quantities of fodder
and of green and other food. The hirer of the cows
has the use of all the accommodation which the farmery
affords the use of dairy utensils, etc., and he undertakes
the entire management of the animals, and of their
produce which belongs to him while they remain in
his hands. And the fact to which we allude is, that the
farmer is willing to let his cows to the " bower " as he
, IS called m Wigtonshire, for from £10 to £12 'a piece •
. which, if their average produce reahses £14 or £15'
seems to leave a small enough margin for the labour
and profit of the dairyman who hires them.

The Cropping of a Dairy Farm has already been
considered We refer to it again under this section to
msist on the great advantage to large dairy farms of a
considerable portion of the land being arable The
. ability to maintain cows during the winter season-
when dry, or not yielding milk enough for the main-
tenance of the general dairy management-on roots
and straw, instead of hay, and thus to set apart a
larger portion of the grass for summer pasture to
Its own great advantage, and to the greater pro-
ductiveness of the cows at- their most prod^ctive
period, cannot be overrated, while the same foods
with a little hay and a liberal allowance of cake or
meal, will enable the farmer to maintain a fuU winter

GENEBAL -MANAGEMENT.

95

dairy. If every 100 acres of grass land, being at
the rate of more than li acres per cow of whole
summer pasture, together with the aftermath of
a corresponding quantity needed for winter hay, will
maintain a herd of 30 dairy cows, then any source of
winter feeding which will displace two-thirds of the
hay required will set free for pasturage two-thirds of
the extent of grass-land to be mown. It is not too
much to say that by 30 acres under arable culture as
much winter food will be provided as by 50 actes of
grass-land mown,. Supposing, then, these 100 acres to
be divided into 80 acres pasture and 20 acres arable, it
is plain that of the half of this pasture (40 acres), which
ordinarily would fall to be mown, at least two-thirds
(26 acres) would be set free by the winter food {straw
and green crops) yielded by the 20 acres arable ; and
the stock capable of being kept on the remaining 80
acres pasture, as compared with that on the 100 acres
of whole pasture, depends on the relative summer
produce of 66 acres whole grass and 14 acres aftermath,
as compared with that of 50 acres whole pasture and
50 acres aftermath. There cannot be a doubt that the
former will yield more food than the latter, and at the
most productive time of the year, while the land will at
the same time, under this plan, be more hkely to
increase from year to year in value. It thus appears
that a larger dairy stock can be kept upon a farm so
managed, while, at the same time, one-half of the
arable land will be yielding its valuable produce oi
crrain for sale. It is, however, also certain that the
use of home-grown beans, peas, and ground oatmeal is
economical and desirable while the prices are so low aa

96 THE DAIEY OP TEE FAEM.

they have been m 1890, and that where pulse cannot
be grown for the purpose, the use of decorticated cotton
cake, bran, and malt-dust should be adopted, not only
on account of their great value in milk-production, but
because of their importance in the improvement of the
manure.

Let us add that the selection and maintenance of the
herd-gentle, regular, and punctual treatment of the
animals throughout the year; provision of sufficient
wholesome food for them, and abundant water, with
frequent_ change of pasturage when in milk-these are
the special maxims of successful dairying. If on the
one side we have the proper cultivation and manage-
ment of the land, and on the other cleanly, careful, and
skilful management m the dairy, then a maximum of
dairy produce may be expected. But this depends
essentially on the health, and therefore on the treat-
ment, of the animals which yield it. If one remark
more be permitted, it should contain the answer of an
old dairy farmer when asked as to the secret of his
success. He had, he said, always seen for himself that
his cows were thoroughly milked out.

CHAPTEE YIII.

FOREIGN DAIRYING.

Scandinavia.— Fkanoe : French Clieeses, Brie, Coulommiers, Gerome,
Jomniao, Livarot, Mont d'Or, Neufohatel, Mignot, Pont I'Eveque,
St. Marcellin, St. Eemy.— Geemant : Limbttrg and Backstein
Cheeses.— Holland : Edam and Gouda Cheese, Delft Butter.—
Italy : Gorgonzola, Parmesan, Eiootta Cheeses. — Switzekland :
Emmerthaler, Gruyere, Vaoherin, Schabzieger.

DENMARK.

It is not necessary to enter fully into the system of
dairying in Denmark, as far greater space would be
required than the limits of this work permit. It may
be remarked, however, that the Danish industry,
though but of comparatively recent creation, has been
conducted so energetically that it has become, if we
consider the size of the country, the most prominent of
any in Europe. It is true, however, that cheese-making
is here still in its infancy, and that there is practically
no cheese which is essentially Danish, which is recog-
nised even in Denmark.

The butter of Denmark is now so famous in this
country that it not only obtains a higher price than
the best Irish, but it sometimes beats the best samples
of salted butters from France; and this the French
authorities themselves admit with regret. At the
present moment the centrifugal separator is doing

98

THE DAIBY OF THE FAEM,

immense work in Denmark, where the system is as
follows : — The cows are milked very early in the
morning, and the milk is immediately passed through
the separator ; but the cream is not churned on the
same day. It is, however, placed in vats where a small
quantity of sour butter-milk is added, in order that it
may be sufficiently ripe for churning on the following
morning, it having been proved beyond doubt that
butter made from sour cream not only keeps better,
but is produced in larger quantities. The barrel and
Holstein churns are in general use, and churning is
continued until the butter comes in small grains, when
the butter-milk is rmi off, and the butter carefully
removed from the churn. Where the butter-worker is
not used — though this, like the separator, is now
becoming popular — the butter is worked and made up
by hand, either upon a small table or in a wooden
trough. Here the dairymaid thoroughly manipulates
it, and as each piece is kneaded it is laid aside and
salt strewn upon the top. When all the butter has
been worked, and the pile is complete, it is cut down
in slices, and these are again kneaded with the hand, in
order to thoroughly amalgamate the salt with the
butter. In hot weather it is laid in hardening boxes
upon which ice is placed (between the first and second
working), but be it observed it is not washed as in
England, the hand of the worker alone being used to
extract the butter-milk. When salted and firm, it is
quickly packed in kegs and sent to the exporter.

A great deal of attention is paid by the Danish
Government to the proper instruction of young people
destined for agriculture ; and the majority of the best

FOREIGN DAIRYING.

99

dairy farmers who are sufficiently interested are pro-
vided with pupils sent by the Professor of Dairying.
These remain at the farm from twelve to eighteen
months, paying a small fee for the instruction
they receive. They feed and milk the cows, assist on
the farm, and are taught in the most complete manner
the whole routine of dairy work. Each pupil is
supplied with a small book, in which is a slip for each
day, and upon this he enters the returns of the cows
under his charge, often endeavouring to show a better
weekly return than his fellows. These figures are
checked by the head dairymaid, who also keeps a book
showing the quantity of milk obtained and cream and
butter yielded, with minor details which are very
necessary in a large dairy. The cream separator is
now generally used, but the Swartz plant, once gene-
rally adopted, is utilised for cooling cream or skim-
mdlk as may be required. This consists of a vat some
9 ft. by 2h to 3 ft. and some 2 ft. in depth, which is
built of concrete or brick lined with cement. At one
end is a tap for the supply of water, and at the other
an outlet pipe to carry surplus water away. This vat
is usually built in the milk-room on the coldest side of
the house, and is in summer daily provided with ice,
which is allowed to float in the water. The Swartz
cans are oval in shape, 24 inches deep, by about 8 inches
wide and 16 inches long. When used for creaming,
the milk remains in these cans from ten to twelve
hours, when the cream has all risen and is skimmed off.
The skim-milk is then taken away, either for manufac-
ture into cheese, or for the house and the cattle, and
the nest milking is poured in. This system is ex-

E 2

100

THE DAIBY OP THE FAEM.

tremely simple, but cannot be properly conducted at a
higher temperature than 45° F. If, therefore, a cold
spring of water can be obtained which will not rise
higher than this, ice will not be required, but in reality
an exceptionally cool milk-room is required in addition
to the water. Ice is generally preserved in Denmark,
either in barns or square yards, with four brick walls,
and if well buried in sawdust and examined weekly, so
that crevices may be filled up by treading the sawdust
in, little difficulty is found in keeping it until the end
of the summer, and frequently, indeed, until a second
summer.

In Sweden and Norway the system of butter-making
is practically the same as in Denmark, and at the pre-
sent time it is the aim of both Swedes and Norwegians
to carry out the Danish system in its entirety, and to
obtain Danish prices. The use of the cream separator
is now being largely extended in these countries, and
every improved appliance is being gradually adopted.
The only cheeses worthy of the name which are made
in Scandinavia, and which are peculiar to it, are the
" Myseost," which is made from whey, and largely
composed of the sugar of milk, and a skim-milk cheese,
flavoured with cummin or carraway seed, which is by
no means unworthy of notice. The manufacture of
Cheddar and Gruyere is now being taught at the Govern-
ment Dairy Schools, but the results we have seen at
the well-equipped schools we have visited leave much
to be desired. The colour of the Myseost is generally
green, but, although sweet, its flavour is by no means
agreeable, and a taste for it has to be acquired before
it can be enjoyed. The whey is boiled upon the

FOBEIGN DAIBYING.

101

fire until almost tkree parts have evaporated, it
being continually stirred the while. During the
process the top or cream of the whey which had
previously been skimmed off is added, and when
a scum or foam appears upon the surface this
process ceases. As may be supposed, after so much
evaporation of water the residuum has become a sticky
paste, which, as we saw at Hanna Neilsen's, was
poured into a mortar, and there beaten with a pestle
by seven or eight pupil dairymaids in turn, until it was
ready to place in the mould, where it remained under
pressure for about two or three days, when it was sold
to be eaten fresh. This cheese can be improved by the
addition of new milk or cream during the process of
heating. The cummin-seed cheese is as a rule very
badly made, but were the Swedes as expert as English
cheese makers they would long since have made it a
leading article of their produce. The dairying capacity
of both Norway and Sweden is considerable, but by no
means so great as is popularly supposed. The traveller
is impressed with the vast areas which are covered by
woods, lakes, and stone. We have seen excellent farms
in both countries, but the best farmers find it necessary
to import British cattle. The cultivation of arable crops
for milk production is very small, grass in summer
and hay in winter being the chief foods, the latter
being largely secured by the laborious method of dry-
ing upon poles or wires ; the cowhouses are substantial
and often cleverly constructed, the finest houses we
have seen in Europe being those of the Stockholm Dairy
Company near Molnby, over which we were shown by
the very able but bhnd manager. There is much to be

102 THE DAIRY OF THE EARM.

desired in some of the country dairy factories, in most
of which export butter is made, and in some skim-milk
cheese of very inferior quahty. The people of all these
countries deserve great praise for the excellent work they
are doing, considering how small is their number, the
poverty of the material, and the modesty of the means at
their command. In the past it has been the practice to
contrast them with Great Britain and unfavourably to
our own country, but no one properly acquainted with
British dairying could make such a mistake. It is not
a matter of superiority of skill that Danish butter sells
so freely in the British market — it is a question of
economics, for we venture to say that there is no branch
of dairy work in which we can be approached by our
energetic and amiable neighbours.

France.

Although the dairy is part and parcel of the system of
agriculture in almost every part of France, it is hardly
necessary, perhaps, to say that it is much more exten-
sive, and far more perfect in its arrangements in the
northern than in the southern departments, where the
culture of the grape is more suitable to the climate and
congenial to the people. It is true that the cultivation
of dairy cattle and the manufacture of the famous
cheeses peculiar to France is conducted in many
districts in the centre and west of the country ; but
there are no farmers who can approach those of Calvados
and La Manche, whether it be in the manufacture of
cheese and butter, the system of cropping for dairy
purposes, or the production of the highest quality of

FOREIGN DAIRYING.

103

dairy cattle. This being the case, the general remarks
which follow have particular reference to those depart-
ments, which may be taken as an example of the highest
class of dairy farming in France.

The cows generally preferred are those known as
the Cotentin, large fleshy cattle of fine quahty, and
magnificent milkers. These animals, together with the
luxuriant pasture of these departments of Normandy,
have much to do with the system which has be^n
adopted and raised to such a pitch of celebrity. While
it is the custom to house the cattle in winter, and to
feed them upon hay— which is seldom built in ricks, but
placed in the barn in small bundles of about 10 lbs.
each— with mangels, turnips, and even carrots and
cake, the farmers have a great idea of summer pastur-
ing ; and to such an extent is this conducted, that we
have seen herds of cattle turned into meadows with
two feet of grass, almost ready for the scythe, into clover,
vetches, and lucerne, where they were tethered as in
Jersey, and into which the dairymaids went three
times a day for the purpose of milking. This is, indeed,
a common custom; and in large dairies, with the aid of
the deep brass camies, holding from four to six gallons,
which are carried upon the head of the girl, or placed in
panniers, two upon either side of the back of a donkey,
the milk is all obtained without the necessity of driving
the cattle home. The dairymaid, like the labourer, is a
hard-working and invaluable servant, whom it would be
difiicult to surpass in this country. When the milk is
taken to the farm, it is first strained, and then poured
into earthenware pans, which somewhat resemble in
shape the galvanised iron pail used in this country,

104

THE DAIEY OP THE FAEM.

although they are deeper and smaller in diameter at the
bottom. Sometimes, however, these pans are almost
oval in shape, with a handle on either side, so that
the system of setting the milk is quite different from
that usually adopted, and is a deep instead of a shallow
one. The milk-room, too, is entirely different from
those common in England. It is generally a plain
apartment with flagged floor, and a gutter down the
centre. The milk-pans are either set upon a small
raised stone or brick shelf upon two or three sides, or
within a vdde gutter, which is formed by brickwork being
set about twenty inches from the wall, this being either
partially filled with water, or so arranged that water is
continually running through it. In some milk-rooms,
however, there is hardly any system, the milk cans
being placed at one end of the apartment in any
position on the main floor. As a rule the churning
and working of the butter is not conducted in this
apartment, which is reserved entirely for milk. There
are three systems adopted in raising the cream. Some-
times it is skimmed from perfectly sweet milk ; and
the butter made from this cream is usually sent to
Paris, and obtains the highest possible prices, for the
Parisians demand excessive mildness in their butter.
In other dairies the cream is allowed to remain until
sour, not being taken off the milk until the latter has
turned, and has become a thick curd. The farmers
correctly believe that they obtain a larger yield of butter
by this means, and they find that it procures a finer
flavour, which is preferred by a large class of consumers.
This butter also keeps better if it is thoroughly well
made, but not unless. Another system which we have

FOREIGN DAIETING,

105

seen adopted in the department of La Manche is that
of artificially souring the milk. The milk-room is placed
behind the kitchen, so that a communication can be
made between the flue and the milk-room. At a certain
time in the day a slide is opened, and a quantity of hot
air is sent into the milk-room, which is at all other
times exceptionally cool, and the sudden change turns
the milk. In these cases, upon lifting the cream in the
pans with the skimmer, the milk miderneath is found
to be an absolutely thick curd. This curd the farmer
uses for two purposes : in some cases for his men, and in
others for his calves, which are entirely fed upon it until
they are fit for the Paris butcher, when they are sent up
in the form of large veal. This fact is worth noting as
affording another means of utiHsing the skimmed milk
with considerable profit. In churning, which practice
is, generally speaking, conducted in time for the
markets of the districts once or twice a week, as the
case may be, the barrel churn is almost invariably used,
and in large dairies two are worked at the same time
by means of a connection through the wall, with a
horse-gear outside. A number of different churns have
at times been exhibited in these departments, but the
farmers do not take to them, and the barrel may be seen
everywhere. The churn is generally turned at a slow
pace until the graniilar butter is formed ; and much
importance is attached to this, for the cleansing, and,
we may almost say, the working of the butter is
conducted within the churn. This could not possibly
be done if it were converted into lumps before churning
was stopped. Where salt is used it is almost invariably
mixed with the butter in the churn, and any practical

106

THE DAIET OF THE FARM.

dairyman will see, after a few moments' reflection, that,
where mild salting is practised, there can be no better
opportunity of thoroughly amalgamating it with the
butter than by pouring it into the churn in the form of
brine while the butter is in this granular form. Every
particle of butter-milk is washed out, and the butter
can be salted to the greatest nicety by means of careful
washing after the brining process, thus modifying the
strength of the salt to the required taste. When this
is done the butter is taken out, very slightly worked,
and made up into huge lumps or cones, and placed in
baskets of appropriate size, ready for market or despatch
by rail to the large blending houses, where it is graded—
blended with margarine or with other samples of similar
quality, coloured, and if necessary salted for England.
Naturally, in some cases, it is put into pots either for
the merchant or for shipment : in others it is prepared,
m the form in which it may be seen in London shops,
in pound or half-pound rolls, or in kilogrammes or half-
kilogrammes. The churning process usually takes place
m an apartment adjoining the milk-room, also paved
with stone, and plentifully supplied with water, these
two materials being a sijie qua non with the French
dairy farmer. On the best dairy farms there is generally
a drainage system for carrying waste milk and butter-
milk into the piggeries, although these are sometimes
at a considerable distance.

Cheeses.— It might almost be said that the variety of
cheeses of France is greater than that of all the rest of
Europe put together. We should not be surprised if
this were the case: at all events the number is very

FOEEIGN DAIRYING.

107

large, although many of the cheeses are quite local and
almost identical with those made in other parts of the
country and known under other names. French writers
divide them into two classes, hard and soft ; the latter
being sub-divided into new and ripe cheeses, and the
former into (1) pressed and salted, and (2) cooked and
pressed cheeses. New cheeses are found in almost
every market in France, and in several forms. Thus
they are made by large milk dealers in the cities from
surplus milk which they cannot hope to dispose of in
any other way. Small farmers manufacture them from
skim-milk, and send them into the markets in a very
tasty form at a very low price, while others with greater
skill make new milk cheeses, or cheeses of combined
new milk and cream, which reahse good prices, giving
them names such as Bondon, Neufchatel, Normandie,
Malakoff, Suisse, double cream, etc. The perfected or
refined soft cheeses, which are seldom sold until com-
pletely ripe, and which are both made and ripened, and
purchased and ripened by the farmers, include those of
Normandy — the principal of which are Camembert,
Livarot, Pont I'Eveque, and Mignot— those of the
departments of Seine, Marne, Oise, Meuse, etc., which
include Brie in its various forms, e.g., Brie de ferme, Brie
com-ant. Brie de saison, the Coulommiers Brie— also
the Troyes, Barberey, Eroy, and the Chaource ; together
with cheap imitations of both Brie and Coulommiers.
Again, among numerous other soft cheeses popular in
France are Mont d'Or, Eollot, Marolles, Langres, Void,
Gerome, St. Florentin, Olivet, Boiirgogne, Macquelines,
Thury, Munster, Compiegnes, and Senecterre. Among
what are called /romar/es a pate ferine, or hard cheeses,

108

THE DAIRY OF THE FARM.

are Eoquefort, imitation Eoquefort, Journiac, Sept-
moncel, Gex,Mont-Cenis, Sassenage, Cantal, Languiole,
and a variety of other cheeses of the Auvergne ; also
Hollandes Fran9aise, or French-made Dutch, fromage
de Bergues, Gruyere and its imitations, Eangiport,
Port du Salut, and the fromages of the Pyrenees, also a
variety of others made "^rom the milk of goats and sheep.

The descriptions following relate to a selected number
of varieties vphich are at the head of their respective
classes, and v^hich are slightly varied in different
departments.*

Brie.— In the manufacture of the Brie cheese the
rennet is added to the milk as the latter comes from the
covr, and in a general way one particular make, that of
Boll, is preferred rather than home-made rennet. Thus
it is always of one strength, and a proper quantity can
be added without difficulty. Eight-twentieths of a cubic
centimetre are used for each litre of milk. The mixture
is set in a tin vessel holding about forty litres, and after
being slightly stirred with a spoon it is left in a room
at a temperature of 65° P. It may be added that in
summer-time, in spite of the evenness of the temper-
ature, six-twentieths only are required to obtain the
same result. At the end of four hours the curd has
become firm and elastic to the touch. It is then placed
in moulds made of tinned iron, two being used for each
cheese, and varying in diameter, some cheeses being
twelve inches across, and others not more than half

*See also "British Dairy Farming," illustrated by the writer of
the.se lines, published by Chapman & Hall, in which this department
is exhaustively treated.

FOREIGN DAIRYING.

109

that size. The top mould fits into the bottom one, and
the curd is filled to its rim, so that when it has drained
and sunk considerably this is taken off. The top mould
is 2 inches, and the bottom 2J inches in depth. The
curd is fit to move when the whey rests on the top quite
clear and bright. For ladling it into the moulds, a
slightly concave tinned iron plate is used. The moulds
stand upon small round boards called planchettes, upon
which straw mats are laid, the boards being placed upon
fluted benches made of cement, from which the whey
drains off. At the end of three hours, when the top mould
is taken off, a dry mat is placed on the top of the cm-d,
and a clean board laid over this, when the cheese in the
bottom mould is inverted and left to drain for eight to
ten hom-s. Next day fresh mats are used in the same
manner, the straws being laid in a contrary way to
those of the previous day, so that the cheese is marked
evenly on each side. The mould is next removed and
the plain cheese left upon the sloping boards, having
been first salted with very fine salt, sprinkled by the left
hand and spread by the right, by means of a goose-quill.
At the end of twelve hours each cheese is laid upon
a round willow frame called a clayette, which is placed
on the top of the cheese, this being at once inverted
and the mat beneath removed. The cheese is next
taken to the drying-room, and salted on the rim and
the outer face, and placed upon shelves to dry, plenty
of air being necessary, and this should be passed through
the room in as energetic a manner as possible. The
cheese is turned morning and evening, a clean clayette
being used each time. On the third or fourth day a
white mould appears in large patches, and when this

110

THE DAIRY OF THE FAEM.

has covered the face of the cheese it is taken to another
apartment, where the currents of air are stronger, but
are regulated at will as it may be found necessary to
hasten or retard the development of ripening. Here
the cheeses are placed upon dry mats resting upon
boards, and turned every twenty-four hours, the mats
being changed each time. The mould becomes blue at
the end of a month, when it is the custom of the
farmers to sell the cheeses either for immediate con-
sumption or for further ripening by the merchants.

Coulommiers. — In the manufacture of Coulommiers,
which resembles Brie in almost every particular, the
rennet should not be added at a temperature exceeding
770 F. The quantity per litre of milk is from one and a
half to three-twentieths of a cubic centimetre, according
to the season, the curd standing thirty-six hours in an
apartment at 64° F. before it is touched, when it is
softer and less elastic than that obtained in the
manufactm'e of the Brie. The remaining portion of
the process resembles that of the Brie; but it may be
added that the cheese is much smaller in diameter,
ripens much quicker, and can, in fact, be eaten with
greater relish on the eighth or tenth day from its
manufacture, when the Brie at this period would be
tasteless.

Gerome — This is a soft round cheese, weighing from
4 lbs. to 8 lbs., and sometimes made with the addition
of aniseed. The milk is coagulated at the temperature
at which it comes from the cow, and is placed in a
deep copper vat holding some 40 quarts, and covered

FOEEIGN DAIRYING.

Ill

with a lid, in the centre of which is a wooden funnel.
To the bottom of this is attached a cloth for straining.
The rennet is home-made, and the quantity added
varies according to its strength, which can be ascer-
tained with a little practice. The curds and whey are
divided with a ladle in half an hour, and the vat
covered for a second half-hour, when the division is
continued until the curd has formed into small pieces
about the size of a nut. "When this has been accom-
phshed it is taken out and put into cylindrical moulds
5 to 9 inches in diameter, two being used to each
cheese, the one fitting into the other. The larger one
is pierced with a number of holes for drainage. The
height of the two moulds when fixed is about 14 inches.
At the end of twelve hours the curd will have sunk into
the bottom mould, when the top is taken off. It is
now called a cheese, and changed into a fresh clean
mould, and placed upside down upon a shelf. In six
hours it is again turned, and it is twice turned during
the two following days. When draining, the cheeses
are always put upon a sloping shelf from which the
whey can run off. The temperature of the room in
which they are made is about 60° F. Salting is next
performed, the two surfaces being well sprinkled ; and
this operation is repeated every three or four days, the
cheeses being turned each time. Turning is continued
for three days after salting, and the surfaces moistened
with tepid water. "When a dry crust has formed, they
are removed to the drying-room, or sechoir, in which
large numbers are kept in a small space, the aeration
and temperature being perfect. "When thoroughly dry,
the Gerome cheeses are taken to the cave or ripening

112

THE DAIEY OF THE FAEM.

cellar, where they raust be carefully managed. The
largest remain here some three to fom' months, and are
frequently turned and washed with slightly tepid water
during the time. As soon as they are brick-red in
appearance, and sufficiently firm to yield to the pres-
sure of the finger, they are marketed. A good Gerome
is firm, rich, and oily, with a few small holes in the
centre, in this respect somewhat resembling G-ruyere.

livarot. — One of the most popular cheeses in France,
and one which is not only profitable in its manufac-
ture, but well adapted for production by our dairy
farmers, is the Livarot, which takes its name from the
town of Livarot in the department of Calvados, the
principal centre of its manufacture. To the workmen,
who consume immense quantities of it, it is almost
indispensable. The milk taken from the cow is creamed
on the following day and poured into large wooden
tubs, holding about 50 gallons, being then brought
to the temperature which it possessed on leaving the
cow. The rennet is then added, in summer one,
and in winter two dessertspoonfuls being required for
every 6 gallons of milk. As a rule this is made on the
premises, several calves' stomachs being cured together,
for each of which a large spoonful of salt and there
glasses of water are used. In one or two hours the
coagulation is complete, when the curd is broken up
and laid upon rushes or a clean cloth. Before placing
in the moulds, it is necessary that the cm'd should be
reduced to small cubes no larger than lumps of sugar.
After having been left to drain for a quarter of an hour,
the curd is placed in the circular wooden moulds, where

POEEIGN- DAIRYING.

113

it completely drains and attains a proper consistence.
This result can be obtained in three or four hours if it
is warmed, but the quality of the cheese will be impaired.
Moreover, it must not be left too long in the moulds — one
to four days, according to the season of the year and the
temperature, being quite sufficient. The moulds are
turned over one hour after the curd has been placed in
them, and this operation is repeated half a dozen times
before the cheeses are released. They are salted with
the hand, and left for four or five days on inclined
wood or stone tables, and then taken to the hdloir, or
the market. The Mloi7' is an apartment with windows
let into opposite walls, through which a current of air
passes for the purpose of desiccating the cheeses placed
in them in various stages upon the lath racks, which have
been previously covered with straw. In this place they
are left for fifteen to thirty days, and then taken to the
cave, all the apertures of which are closed, and in which a
uniform temperature is kept. In consequence of the gas
given off from the cheeses, the walls are not made of
brick or stone, but of mortar mixed with chopped hay.
The cheeses, placed on planks, are turned twice weekly
in winter, and three times weekly in summer, being
slightly wetted each time with pure water, and salted
afresh when necessary. At the end of eight or ten days
in the cave they are set on their edges on a species of
sedge to assist the process of drying. They remain
in the cave for three to six months, according to
their size, and, when packed for transmission to
market, are coloured with annatto. It requires about
five pints of milk to make a cheese; and September
and October are the months chosen in which to

114

THE DAIRY OP THE FAHM.

commence the process of manufacture. Several
makers of Livarot cheese manufacture from 5,000
to 8,000 dozen in a season, besides purchasing
many white ones to perfect in their own caves, which
Bell at 3i to 8| francs per dozen, and ultimately reahse
15 to 20 francs, or, during Lent, 20 to 30 francs. At
the Lisieux market, one of the best in the Department,
three varieties of cheese are sold — white cheese, which
is eaten fresh and is most delicious, at 2d. retail, or
1.20 to 2 francs the dozen; Camembert, of medium
quality, from 4 to 5.50 francs; and Livarot, which varies
from 9 to 11 ficancs the dozen; while at St. Pierre
about 1,000 dozen are sold in the market every week,
at an average of 7 francs the dozen. At the markets of
Vimoutiers. Livarot, Lisieux, St. Pierre, and at Lisieux
Station, very large quantities are also sold ; and, since
1866, the total value of the cheeses manufactured has
more than doubled.

Journiac— This cheese is made to resemble Koque-
fort, but instead of being manufactured from ewes'
milk it is entirely composed of the milk of the cow.
The following is the system adopted at the farm of
M. Laforce, who resides some 3,300 feet above the
level of the sea. "When the milk comes from the
cow it is poured into a wooden pan, made of pine,
which will hold the milk from a hundred cows.
It is then carried to the cheese-room, and the rennet is
iromediately added. After the curdling and the separa-
tion of the whey are complete the curd is placed in
cheese-moulds made of tinned iron, in which it is left
to drain for three or four days, and afterwards carried

FOREIGN DAIRYING.

115

to the cave, which is kept at a uniform temperature oi
77° E., where it is constantly watched and attended to
by special workmen. Every cheese is turned daily and
frequently sprinkled with fine white salt. After a short
time they are removed to other caves, which are much
colder and provided with strong currents of air. Here
they are placed upon their sides and pricked to the
centre with needles in order to place in contact with
the air a fine meal composed of rye, wheat, and barley-
meal, which, at the moment of placing the curd in the
cheese-moulds, was laid within the body of the cheese.
This composition, when properly made, gives rise to
the formation of a blue mould in the interior of the
cheeses ; and if the colour is of a fine blue it is classed
as first quality, providing of course it is of equal flavour.
During the time the cheeses remain in the second cave
they are daily rolled and scraped, in order to avoid
spontaneous growth of foreign fungi. They are usually
ripe at the end of two months, and despatched for sale
in cases holding one dozen each.

Mont d'Or. — These very delicious small cheeses are
made of new milk, either by the addition of the
morning's to the evening's, or twice a day. The rennet
is not added to the milk, but the milk to the rennet,
this being placed in the vessel in which setting is to
take place. When thoroughly firm the curd is broken
up and placed in single hoops, similar to those used fol
Coulommiers ; these, however, being placed upon larger
hoops, which are made of wood, and on the top of
these a couple of straw mats are laid to encourage
draining and prevent curd passing through. The

I 2

116

THE DAIRY OF THE FARM.

diameter of the metal hoop is from 12 to 13 centi-
metres, and that of the wooden one a shade more, the
height of each being about 8 centimetres. When the
moulds are filled, they are placed upon a fluted inclined
shelf in order to drain, each cheese being turned at the
end of two hours, when clean mats replace the wet
ones. Next day the same process takes place, when
they are carried to the scchoir for further drying,
shelves covered with rye straw being provided for the
purpose, and the cheese is here taken out of the
mould. Turning takes place four times a day, but
there is no salting other than that which results from
a continual damping of each surface with brine. When
sufficiently dry, at the end of two or three days the
cheeses are removed to the ripening-room, where they
remain for a week during warm, and a fortnight in
cold, weather.

Roquefort. — It is only necessary to refer to the
Roquefort cheese — to state that it is made of sheep's
milk, that the system of manufacture is somewhat
intricate, and that, as it is not Hkely to be attempted
in this country, we do not deem it necessary to give a
detailed description.

Weufcliatel. — This little cheese, which takes its name
from the little town in the Brie district, in the Depart-
ment of Seine-Inferieure, is largely imitated by milk
dealers in London, who find the system a ready way
of disposing of their surplus and sometimes spoiled
milk. It is sold both new and ripened, and is
made from poor and rich milk respectively, those

FOBEIGN DAIRYING.

117

made from skimmed milk being largely consumed by
the poorer classes. The milk is coagulated in vessels
holding about twelve quarts, the rennet being added
when the temperatm-e is about 90° F. The pans are
left from thirty-six to forty-eight hours, after which
the curd is deposited in cloths, which are hung to drain
over square forms, the corners of the cloths being fixed
to the four corners. It is next put into a dry cloth
and slightly pressed for nine hours or more if the whey is
not extracted. Being now tolerably soHd, it is placed
in small cyhndrical moulds, which give it its shape,
salted at the ends, placed on planks in rows, and carried
to the perfecting or ripening cellar. In a few days a
white mould appears, and it is then ready for the
market as a new cheese. If ripening is to be complete
it remains much longer and is regularly turned. One
pound of rich milk is estimated to make a cheese, so
that as a gallon will make ten, and the poorest cheeses
reaUse a penny each, the maker does remarkably well
with his milk. Naturally the prices vary according to
the quahty, some makers preferring to add cream to
the milk, while others use skim-milk only. There are
a variety of ways of manufacturing these white cheeses,
whether they are to be ripened or not. In some cases
a mould is used which resembles a small box about 3
inches high by 4 inches square, holes being pierced in
the sides. In other cases a similar box is used, which
stands upon four legs; and in others again a heart-
shaped wicker frame is adopted, or a round mould of
wood in which holes are similarly pierced. The curd
of skim-milk is used in several forms for the manufac-
tm-e of fresh soft cheeses, and is even sold in its new

118

THE DAIRY OF THE FARM.

state for that purpose. In some cases, where it has
been made at a temperature of 80° F., it is mixed with
a small quantity of cream, and when the two are
thoroughly amalgamated the mixture is put into small
moulds, and left to drain ; but the curd must be par-
ticularly soft ox the amalgamation will not be perfect.
Little cheeses of this natm'e can be made in so many
ways that it is not surprising the French take so much
trouble to understand and manufacture them, and that
we should be able to see such numbers of different
varieties in their country markets.

Camembert. — This is the most popular French cheese
among English consumers. It was invented nearly a
century ago by Marie Fontaine, ancestress of the Paynel
family, some of the best makers of the present day, the
farm of one of whom (Mesnil Mauger) we visited, to see
the process of manufacture, several years ago. It takes
its name from the commune of Camembert, in which
Mdlle. Fontaine resided. The cheese is made from
whole milk, and cream is not added as is popularly
supposed. There are imitations made of partially
skimmed milk, which are now flooding the English
market, but they do not possess the quality of the real
article. A portion of the morning's milk is added to
the milk of the previous evening, this being heated
in a tub to temperatures varying between 80° and
90° F.,when the rennet is added, the quantity depend-
ing chiefly upon its strength and the time of the year.

As an even quality of rennet is very important,
some makers prefer not to manufacture their own.
We have always found patent rennet answer the

FOEEIGN DAIRYING.

lis

purpose better than rennet of any other kind, pro-
ducing cheese of the finest quaHty. When mixed,
the milk is stirred for two or three minutes. It
is then covered and left for two to four hours,
according to the season, and when the finger can be laid
upon the surface without curd adhering, it is ready for
work. The curd is next taken out with spoons, and
placed in small cylindrical metal moulds, some four
inches in diameter, in which the cheese is shaped.
These are open at both ends, and stand upon rush
mats which are laid upon sloping tables, with gutters at
the ledge for carrying off the whey as it runs down
from the cheeses. As a rule 2 to 2J litres of milk
are required to make each cheese. After remaining all
day in the moulds, the cheeses are first turned, with
the faces upon clean mats, and left to drain until the
next day, when they are again turned. "WTaen quite
firm they are taken out of the moulds, rapidly salted,
placed upon wooden shelves, and left for two or three
days, being regularly turned until they are ready to
send to the drying-room, where they are laid upon
shelves covered with straw. This drying-room, or
hdloir, is specially designed to admit as much air as
possible, the more energetic the current the better ;
although it must not be carried straight through from
window to window, but arranged so as to affect the
whole apartment, as shelves are placed from top to
bottom. The windows must also be covered with fine
wire gauze, to prevent the entrance of insects and dust.
The cheeses must be daily examined while under the
drying process, and turned or removed as may be
required. They remain in this apartment from fifteen

120

THE DAIRY OF THE EAEM.

to twenty-five days, according to the season. During the
first week they are turned daily, and afterwards every
other day. About the tenth day they become covered
here and there vsdth fine white patches of mould, which
gradually extend over the whole cheese. They are
not removed until they no longer stick to the fingers
when touched. The next process is that of ripening in
the cave de perfection, or curing cellar, which is an
apartment with glazed windows and interior shutters
arranged to prevent the entrance of the sun. The
temperature must be low — about 50° F. — and the
apartment slightly humid. Too much moisture is not
desirable, and the floors are often paved to prevent
this. Shelves are built round the room, and upon these
cheeses are placed according to their age. As they are
taken from the top, the lower tiers are removed up, and
space left for new cheeses as they arrive — a foot
dividing each shelf. The cheeses remain here from ten
to twenty days, during which time the most constant
attention is paid to them, for they are turned almost
every day, and every phase of fermentation watched,
and assisted or checked as may be found necessary.
On some farms they are made all the year round, large
dealers purchasing the cheeses from the smaller makers
in their new state, and drying and ripening them
themselves in their own specially prepared apartments.

The most imperfect ripening is that of summer ;
hence cheeses are seldom made by farmers during the
hot months. "When the process is complete, each
cheese is wrapped in paper and packed away in sixes,
and again wrapped up and packed in wooden cases or
willow baskets in wheat chaff, and despatched to the

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121

markets. In the best season they reach 6s. 6cZ. to
7s. Gel. a dozen, but in summer they are often sold as
low as 4s. — realising, however, Id. to 8d. each in the
London markets. Upon the average, it takes 2 litres
to make a cheese of 300 grammes, or about 101-
ounces. M. Paynel used 1,000 litres of milk daily when
making Camembert, and turned out some 500 cheeses
per day, these yielding him an average of 6s. 6cZ. a dozen.
A good Cotentin cow is expected to give 3,000 litres
of milk, or about 1,600 cheeses, which, at 5s.6cZ. a dozen,
would be nearly £'65. In the Department of Calvados
many farmers make from 10,000 to 160,000 cheeses each ;
while from the village in which M. Paynel resides,
twenty-fom: makers in one season sent out 62,000
dozen. The price of Camembert cheese, however, has
fallen since our visit to Mesnil, and the competition in
the English market is now very keen.

Mignot. — This cheese receives its name from the
family of Mignot, who were the first to make it. It is
made in two varieties — the new or white cheese produced
from April to September, and the Mignot passe from
September to April, the latter being the more valuable.
The milk of the morning is creamed in the evening, and
mixed with the evening's milk. It is then heated until
it slightly scalds the finger, when it is poured into
earthen vessels and a spoonful of rennet added to every
40 litres. It is next placed near the fire, and left from
eight p.m. until six the following morning, being covered
the while Math a double cloth with a small hole in the top
to prevent souring. The coagulation is very slow, but
when it is effected the work of manufacture is proceeded

122

THE DAIRY OF THE PAEM.

with as in the case of the Pont I'Eveque, with the ex-
ception that the Mignot is drained less than that cheese.
In making the white cheese, the midday milk is skimmed
in the evening, and mixed with the evening's milk, both
being warmed as before-mentioned. It is then placed
in earthenware vessels and covered with a cloth imtil
the next morning, when it is skimmed and used with
the new milk of the morning, after which the rennet is
added. The rest of the process is as for the Mignot
passe, both cheeses being subjected to very slow drainage
of the whey. They are rapidly made, salted upon the
evening of the day they are put in the moulds, dried
almost without air, and despatched to market a day or
two afterwards. When ripe, the Mignot has a rich
golden colour, and resembles the Livarot and Pont
I'Eveque in flavour. It is made in both round and
square forms, and reaches 4s. to 5s. a dozen in winter.

Pont I'Eveque. — This popular little cheese is made in
the district of the town from which it takes its name,
between Lisieux and Honfleur. Its original name was
Angelot, or, as some think, Augelot, from the valley of
the Auge (Oise). It is now ma("e in three quahties,
according to the quantity of cream used in its manufac-
ture. In the first quality the fleurette, or first cream,
is added to new milk after milking ; or with some makers
pure milk is used alone. The second quality is made
from the morning's milk which has been added to the
evening's milk after skimming ; while the third quality is
made from the skim-milk of three milkings, without any
addition of new milk. In autumn four milkings are
sometimes mixed, but in summer seldom more than two ;

FOREIGN DAIETING.

while in winter five and even six are occasionally used.
In making cheeses from new milk, the latter is placed
upon the fire until lukewarm, when the rennet is added,
and as in the case of the Camembert, just sufficient is
used to cause coagulation, too much giving a disagreeable
flavour, and causing too active a separation. No rule as
to quantity can be given, this being ascertained only by
practice with the particular rennet. The milk is stirred
with the hand, and left for about fifteen minutes, when
the whole becomes set. It is then cut to the bottom of
the vessel with a wooden knife, and left five minutes after
being covered with a cloth. The curd is next taken
out, and laid upon reed mats, called glottes, where it is
left to drain for a short time. The square moulds,
made of ash or beech, are then filled with curd and
placed upon the same mats until drainage is complete,
these being turned several times during the half-hour
following the operation, and many more times during
the day. After being continually placed upon fresh dry
mats of a similar kind, in forty-eight hours the cheeses
are taken from the mould, and salted with fine dry white
salt. One side is salted in the morning and the other
in the evening, only a small quantity of salt being used.
They are then taken to the sechoir, or drying-room,
and placed upon long shelves suspended from the
ceiling. This apartment is aired or ventilated, as
described above. The cheeses remain equi-distant
from one another for two or three days, and are turned
only once a day, and when dry they are carried to the
ripening cave or cellar, and laid close to each other in
boxes, this close proximity being supposed to assist
their ripening. Great care must, however, be exercised ;

124

THE DAIKY OF THE FAEM.

they must be frequently examined, and turned over
every two days, and afterwards stood upright, and
finally flat one upon the top of the other. They remain
from two to four months in this apartment, according
to their size and quality ; the richest remaining for a
less period than the poorest, and if these are small and
thin, fifteen to twenty days is often sufficient to perfect
them. Poor cheeses which are kept for a long period
sometimes become too hard, when they are enveloped
in a cloth damped with whey, this process making
them more tender. A well-made Pbnt I'Eveque cheese
retains its qualities for a year, and even two years, if
properly taken care of ; but it must be prevented from
coming into contact with damp and too much air.
The richest cheeses are made in the autumn, the mid-
summer cheeses being generally from milk which has
been skimmed for butter-making. This cheese has a
tendency to harden, but this is prevented in a great
measure by the addition of a little boiling water in the
milk when it is put together. Milk used for the manu-
facture of this cheese in summer must not exceed a
lukewarm heat, or it will become too hard, whereas in
autumn and winter the makers prefer that it should
slightly burn the finger.

In making the second quahty of cheese, a litre of
boiling water is generally added to six or seven litres of
milk, a Httle more being used in autumn than in
summer. In making the third quality the makers
simply boil the water, which is poured into the milk, the
latter not being heated at all. Great care, however, is
needed, as old milk is liable to turn. This cheese must
be eaten quickly, as it will not keep more than about

FOEEIGN DAIRYING.

125

three months, but otherwise it is almost as fine as
cheese made from whole milk. It becomes a velvety
blue in three weeks, showing that it is ripe, when it
should be at once marketed. To make a good cheese
valued at Is. 3d., 4 litres of new milk are required; and
5 to 6 for a 2-franc, or Is. 8d., cheese ; thus 4
Htres, valued in England at about 7d., produce a cheese
worth double the money, in addition to the whey,
which would increase the return. The richest of these
Pont I'Eveque cheeses, called "Bespoken," and made
of two- thirds whole milk and one-third cream, are
seldom marketed, but reach from 30 to 40 francs per
dozen, and are found upon the tables of the rich in
Paris and other parts of France. Many of the farmers
in the district manufacture from 4,000 to 5,000 cheeses
per annum.

St. Marcellin. — This cheese is made from goat's
milk, unskimmed, and derives its name from the
district in which it is made. The cheeses weigh from
about 4 to 4J ounces, and, if eaten fresh, should be
consumed within twenty-four hours. In hot weather
they are considered particularly agreeable, though
called cheeses of the third quality. The rennet is
manufactured according to the custom of each par-
ticular farmer, but is generally made from calves' veils
and white dry wine. No definite rule can be given as
to the quantity to be used, as this varies with different
makers, and according to its strength; but a little
practice will determine this point. If too much is
used the cheese becomes slightly sour. In winter the
milk is heated a little before working commences, but

126

THE DAIRY OP THE FAEM.

not in summer. When the milk is curdled, it is placed
in small goblets or mugs, holding about two pints,
which are perforated all over the sui'face. After it is
sufficiently drained, and unable to lose its form, it is
quickly salted, taken from the moulds, and placed in
an apartment upon a shelf, on which is a layer of rye
straw. This apartment must be well aerated and in a
sheltered position, and the cheeses turned and salted
daily during the hot weather ; once every two days
being sufficient in the cold season. When they com-
mence to dry, the crust assumes a yellowish, and
subsequently a blue, colour ; and in this state may be
marketed as cheeses of the second quality. In order to
make a more perfect article the cheeses are placed in a
closed compartment in a cellar, being always laid upon
straw. Here they take a blue, and then a yellow,
mould, and are considered to be of the best or first
quality. The chief featm-e in the manufacture of St.
Marcellin cheese is, that the most rigid cleanliness
is observed in every operation. Second and third
qualities can also be made from unskimmed cow's
milk, while good cheeses may be manufactured by
adding to the goat's milk 25 per cent, of milk from the
cow. It is questionable, however, whether we in this
country can make so tasty an article in the absence of
the peculiar and exceptional pasturage cultivated by the
French farmers of the district in which this cheese is
made.

St. Remy. — The milk and rennet are put together
for the manufacture of this cheese, at a temperature of
95° ; 10 to 12 grammes — a third, or a little over a

POBEIGN DAIEYING.

127

third of an ounce— of rennet being used for every
100 litres of milk. If the milk is not set direct from
the cow, it must be warmed until it reaches the
reqiiired temperature. St. Eemy cheese is sometimes
made from mixed milk and sometimes from new milk,
according to the system of the maker. The curd is
usually formed in from twenty to twenty-five minutes ;
but if at the end of this time it is not fit for use, a
small additional quantity of rennet is added, without
re-warming the milk. When firm it is cut into pieces
with a utensil made for the purpose to assist the
separation, and it is then left for half an hour, after
which the whey is removed and the curd placed in the
moulds, which are allowed to stand upon a sloping
table until late in the afternoon, or six or seven hours
from the time of commencing the work, when
they are turned and left to drain until the next
morning. They are then salted for the first time,
and again turned and left for twenty-four hours.
Next day they are again slightly salted, and when
fairly dry are placed upon small plates or dishes,
and laid upon shelves and turned two or three times
daily ; the plates, which are of wood, being moistened
each time. If they become at all hard they are washed
with lukewarm skim-milk, with the aid of a brush.
When thoroughly drained they are put upon drying
shelves until quite dry and fit for the refining cave;
but before being taken here they are usually passed
through some fresh water, whatever the season of the
year may be. When in the cave, which is a particu-
larly cool cellar, they are washed at least twice a week
in summer with a brush, care being taken to remove all

128

THE DAIET OF THE PAEM.

mouldiness as it appears ; but the washing is not needed
so much as they proceed in the ripening process.

GEEMANY.

There are a variety of systems in force in the different
countries of which this nation is composed, but it is not
necessary to refer to any other than that which is general
in North Germany, for in the South butter-making as
well las cheese-making is conducted in an old-fashioned
manner, which would afford no instruction to the modern
dairy farmer. North Germany has become an impor-
tant dairy district, since the first factory was built at
Kiel, this having been but the precursor of many others
which are now in full work in various parts of Sleswig-
Holstein, Brunswick, and Hanover. Perhaps the most
intelligent portion of North German dairying is in
connection with these factories, to which the farmers
send their milk for conversion into butter and cheese,
receiving in retm-n a sufficient sum to pay them well
for their trouble. Home dairying in Germany is neither
advanced nor especially intelligent, and cannot compare
with that of either France or Denmark; but scientific
dairying is equal to that of either country, for German
scientists in this department have no superior in Europe.
As in Denmark, it is the custom in the factories to
manufacture keeping butter, much of which is sent out
in little round pots with covers, which hold a kilo-
gramme (a little over 2 lbs.) ; and which, being salted,
will keep for a length of time. The butter is invariably
made from cream which has been soured, whether it has

FOEEIGN DAIEYING.

129

been separated by the centrifugal machine or raised in
the Swartz vat; and it is abnost invariably churned in
a vertical churn known in this country as the Holstein.
As a general rule, the farmers who conduct their own
dairies churn imtil the butter has become solid, when
they fail to thoroughly cleanse it, and often salt it too
highly, but great efforts are being made to educate them
and their families in the various dairy schools which
are numerous in Germany. In the factories an excellent
system is conducted ; the milk is heated after its
arrival, skimmed by the separator, and the skim and
butter milks largely used in the manufacture of cheese.
Most factories sell cream in two qualities, as is some-
times done in London ; and they also seU skim-milk and
butter-milk to the poor, their vans being seen in every
large city, with the taps of the cream, new, skim, and
butter milk outside, with the prices of the day painted
over each. Some Germans also use their butter-milk
for their horses, for which it is a valuable food, and said
to pay much better than giving it to pigs. Pigs, how-
ever, are largely kept for the purpose of consuming the
whey and such milk as cannot otherwise be disposed of.
There is perhaps more care taken to prepare foods for the
poorer classes than in any other dairying country ; for,
in addition to the milk above mentioned, curds are
largely sold at l^d. a pou.nd, much of which is made
from butter-milk, while sldm-milk and butter-milk sell
at remmierative prices. The principal cheeses made in
Germany are also particularly adapted for consumption
by the poor, and of these we may specially name the
Jjimburg and Backstein; the latter being made in
varieties known as Lab kase, Hartz kase, and Saur kase.

130

THE DAIRY OF THE PAEM.

The IiiinTjitrg Cheese, which is also largely made in
Belgium, and which is almost the only dairy product
at all famous in that country, is manufactured &om
skim-milk, and reahses in North Germany about 2^d.
a pound to the maker, selling retail at 3d. each. It is
made from milk at a temperature of about 95° F.,
sufficient rennet being added to set the curd in forty
minutes. There is no great art in its manufacture, for
immediately it is fit to work the curd is ladled out of
the vat and placed in the moulds upon a table made for
the purpose. This table may be two yards long by
two and a half feet broad, one end being higher than
the other. It is divided into squares by movable
partitions, which may be made of wood or tin, so that
when these are fixed in position there are a number of
moulds or divisions four inches square. These divisions
are perforated, and along the bottom of the table are
very small fluted channels for carrying off the whey.
Sometimes the curd is laid on the tables before the
divisions are inserted, these being placed in the curd
when it has become firm. On the following day the
cheeses are formed, taken out and salted, being turned
several times for three days upon the shelves upon
which they stand, when they are taken to the drying-
room, and remain sometimes for a considerable period.
Occasionally the Limburg is sold fresh, but it may be
kept until thoroughly ripe, at the end of two or three
months, when it obtains a higher price. 100 litres of
milk (22 gallons) usually make 8 kilogrammes (about
18 lbs.) of cheese.

The Harta Kiae is made from skiimned sour-milk at

FOEEIGN DAIRYING.

131

a temperature of 90° F., the whey being completely
separated from the curd by the process. At the end of
a few hours the curd is dipped out of the vat and placed
on a similar table to that used for the Limburg, but in
addition it is pressed by weights which are put upon
the top of each cheese. In a short time the curd is then
placed in a mixing-tub and salted at the rate of one
ounce of salt to three pounds. It is then ground,
worked, and once more placed in the moulds upon the
table. They are next again slightly pressed, taken out
of the moulds and put upon the shelves of the cheese-
room to dry, being turned at first twice a day, and
afterwards once only. They are then taken to the
curing cellar ; but, unlike the French, who encourage a
growth of fungus, this is destroyed as rapidly as it
appears, by being brushed off.

Backstein. — There are a variety of systems by which
this cheese is made, although they do not materially
differ ; it is manufactured either from skim or half-
skimmed milk at a similar temperature to that adopted
for the Limburg, being also converted into curd in the
same period of time. After setting, instead of being
immediately placed on the cheese-table, it is cut up
into cubes to allow the whey to drain, and afterwards
again cut into cubes for the same purpose. It is next
placed in the wooded moulds similar to those used for
Limburg ; and when sufficiently solid, each cheese is
taken out and treated in a similar manner to that which
we have described above for the Limburg. There are
also a variety of cheeses known by other names made
in North Germany, but the systems of manufacture

132

THE DAIRY OP THE FAEM.

closely resemble those already described. In tbe South,
however, there are a few kinds which need not be
referred to, as they resemble in almost everything but
name those which we have described as being made in
France and Switzerland.

HOLLAND.

Although the greater portion of the Netherlands is
devoted to dairying, the chief dairying districts are
North and South Holland and Friesland, each of which
has its specialite. In the first, the famous Edam or
round Dutch cheese is manufactured, together with the
almost equally well-known Campine butter ; in the
second, the flat Dutch or Gouda cheese is a staple in-
dustry, in addition to the butter of Delft ; while Fries-
land is, perhaps, more famous than either for its butter,
one port alone in this province having exported 400
tons in one season. In North Holland it is the custom
of the dairy farmers to sell their worst calves at a
month old, rearing the best for the dairy, and it is re-
markable that throughout Holland larger numbers of
cattle are kept per acre than perhaps in any other
dairying country. In raising cream the Dutch farmer
still uses the shallow pan, but it is of wood, although
in many cases the Swartz system is fashionable. In
South Holland the best farmers expect to realise 660
gallons of milk per cow, one gallon making a pound of
cheese ; and we are not surprised at this, for the size
and milking quahties of Dutch cows are generally
known. In the best dairies it is customary to skim at

FOEEIGN DAIETING.

133

twelve hours to make the first quality of butter, and
at twenty-four for the second; but twenty-four and
thirty-six hours' skimming are most frequent with the
small farmers.

In the manufacture of Delft butter the milk is first
cooled in copper vessels, which stand in very cold
water for two hours. It is then transferred into shallow
pans in a cool dairy, skimming taking place at twelve,
eighteen, and twenty-four hours. The churns used
are exceedingly primitive and much inferior to those
adopted in this country. The working of the butter is
done by hand ; but as a general rule it is not thoroughly
well washed nor too carefully made, but the salting and
packing are exceedingly well managed. Although an im-
mense quantity of butter is imported into this country
from Holland, there is very little of high quality, or
such as our makers need attempt to produce, the
greater part of it being an imitation, in the art of pro-
ducing which the Dutch seem to have long taken the
lead. There are numerous factories in Holland, and
large quantities of inferior butter, especially Campine,
are made for the purposes of mixing with, and giving a
character to, the imitation they turn out.

Edam. — The most famous dairy products of Holland,
so far as British consumers are concerned, are the
Edam and Gouda cheeses. The former is the round,
red Dutch, and we have seen it made' as follows: — The
rennet is added to the milk at a temperature of 90° F.,
and in twenty to twenty-five minutes it is cut with an
instrument resembling a lyre with a dozen strings.
After standing for a short time for the separation to

134

THE DAIRY OP THE FARM.

take place, the whey is taken out and the curd after-
wards thoroughly worked by the hand ; when fit, the
curd is placed in the moulds which, in this case, the
cheese being globular, are divided into halves. When
full, the two halves are pressed together, and pressed
as tightly as possible. The soHd curd is next taken
out, a cloth is wrapped round it, and it is placed in
fresh moulds, and subjected to pressure in a lever press
until the next day. The moulds are placed in dishes
to catch the whey, and the same pressure is generally
exerted upon several cheeses at one time. At the end
of some hours the cheese cloth is removed, and the
cheese placed in a semicircular mould with a foot to it,
and several holes perforated in the sides. A piece of
fiat board is then placed on top, and it is again put
under the press. After sufficient pressure has been
obtained, the cheeses are salted and turned daily for
eight or ten days, at the end of which time they are
soaked in brine and subsequently dried, coloured, and
rubbed with linseed oil.

Gouda. — In the manufacture of the flat Dutch or
Gouda cheese there is some resemblance to the Edam
system; the rennet coagulating the milk in about
forty minutes, after which time the curd is gently cut
and the whey allowed to separate for ten minutes,
when it is again manipulated. After another rest the
curd settles at the bottom of the vat, and the whey is
drawn off. Hot whey is then mixed with the curd,
and it is again allowed to remain for a short time, the
whey being subsequently removed with a utensil
specially made for baling. The curd is afterwards

FOEEIGN DAIRYING.

135

well worked and evenly broken up. It is then pressed
in the bottom of the vat and again broken up, as a mill
is not used. It is afterwards placed in perforated
moulds (being previously covered with cloth) which are
immediately put to press, the pressure being increased
re<mlarly until the following day, when it is turned and
provided with a clean cloth. The cheeses are then laid
in salt and water, where they remain for three days,
after which they are washed with whey and taken to
the drying-room. Here they are placed upon shelves, '
and daily turned until the second week, when turning
is performed every other day. At the end of a month
they are fit for sale, but it is the custom of some of the
better makers to keep them for a much longer period,
when the flavour is considerably improved and the
consistence is more mellow. The Gouda cheese is
generally made of new milk, but, as in all cheeses, there
are many farmers who sldm the milk once before they
set it for curd.

ITAIiY.

Butter-iuaHng in Italy is not generally conducted
upon a principle which can be termed either modern
or perfect. Upon small farms, the cream, which is
raised in open pans, often made of wood, is chm-ned m
cylindrical churns, the beaters within being turned
instead of the churn itself. This is the general custom
in Lombardy. In Piedmont it is quite common for
the farmer to place his cream at 50° E. into a round
box called a Purragie, which has a kind of spoon

136

THE DAIBY OF THE FAEM.

attached to the axle. This is turned by a crank, and the
reyolution of the spoon is upon the inside of the peri-
phery of the box. This process is rather laborious, and
requires the services of two men. " The dairyman of
Parma," we are told, " beats his milk with a cream
whipper, and skilfully lets the floating cream, which
gathers into a bucket, overflow into a fine-edged wooden
bowl, and thence into the churn." In summer ten
pounds of ice are added to thirty quarts of cream, while
in winter the cream is heated, the temperature being
usually kept at from 57° to 67° F., the Itahans per-
mitting a pretty wide margin. When in the churn the
cream is beaten by two men alternately with a butter
beater attached to a frame, this being raised and
lowered by leverage. The butter forms in about forty
to forty-five minutes, water being added if formation is
desired quickly, and ice if it is necessary to retard it.
The butter is worked by hand, formed in large lumps,
and left to drain. In some parts of Italy it is cus-
tomary to keep butter in bladders, a method which is
considered very convenient, and which enables it to be
kept for a length of time. There are a few excellent
butter factories in Italy, some of which export butter
to England and India ; and, with the help of the
modern dairy schools, with some of which we are
acquainted, Italian dairying is likely to improve.

We have inspected some excellent cheese factories
in Italy, numbers of which have been started since the
year 1873-74, when the Government offered large
prizes and gold medals to the best-managed associa-
tions. In Sicily, strange to say, small dairymen,
instead of daily manipulating their own milk, take it

FOEBIGN DAIETING.

137

to the large cowkeepers, until they have delivered
some 300 quarts. They then receive that quantity
back at one time, and deal with it in the manufacture
of butter or cheese, this system of reciprocity being
found mutually beneficial. The Italian cheeses known
in England are the Parmesan and the Gorgonzola.
These popular varieties are very largely made, and we
have devoted considerable time to a study of their
manufacture, both in Lombardy and Parma.

Gorgonzola— In making this cheese the milk is
coagulated while warm from the cow, great attention
being paid to the preparation of the rennet, the
quantity required being only ascertained by experience.
The curd is set in from fifteen to twenty minutes.
The whey is then separated as much as possible, and
the curd hung up to drain in coarse strainers. This
process is conducted twice daily, after each milking.
By the time the evening's curd is ready that of the
morning is naturally cold ; but the cheese is composed
of the two, the cold curd being placed in the centre and
the warm at the top and bottom. Thus each cheese is
made up of three layers, and as the hot and cold curd
never properly combine, two sets of interstices are, as
it were, created, in which, as it matures, the well-
known green mould forms, and adds to the cheese the
delightful flavour which is so much approved in this
country. During the first day of manufacture the
cheese is turned three times, and on the following
morning it is put into a clean cloth and salted, this
process being continued for at least a week, sometnnes
longer, one ounce of salt generally being used to about

188

THE DAIRY OF THE FABM.

eight pounds of curd. In some cases the salting
operation is conducted by a special process of turning
and pressing against a salted surface, this giving ?■
better crust to the cheese. The wooden mould withi'
which the curd was placed in the first instance is not
removed until the fourth day, when the cheese Jias
commenced to ferment. At the end of twenty-five
days a good cheese is generally a pinkish white in
colour ; but if it is inferior it becomes nearly black, the
crust in this case being soft, and the body of the
cheese rapidly deteriorating. If, however, the crust is
hard, washing in brine will improve it. The tempera-
ture of the cheese-room is usually between 67° and
67° F. The ripening process commences in April, and
frequently continues until August. One gallon of milk
usually makes one pound of Gorgonzola cheese.

The Parmesan, or Formaggio di Grana, cheese is very
largely made in Italy. In its manufacture the milk,
often skimmed, is heated, according to its condition and
age, from 77° to 86° although this is somewhat
guess-work, for the distinction is almost invariably
made by hand. The rennet, which is a pulpy material
made from the actual stomach of the calf, is then added
in the proportion of half-an-ounce to 500 gallons. The
principle it contains is dissolved by the aid of a pestle
in small wooden utensils made for the purpose, and
filtered through a fine sieve directly into the milk vat.
The curd having formed, is broken with a utensil
called a rotilla, a disc being at the bottom end. The
working is continued for forty minutes, with intervals
every now and then, that the curd may be consolidated

FOREIGN DAIEYING.

139

but not hardened. When the whey is removed, half-
an ounce of saffron is added to the contents of the vat
per 80 gallons. The i^an containing the curd is next
placed upon the fire and heated for nearly an hour up
to a temperature of 112° F., being stirred during the
time with the utensil named above. When the curd has
broken up into minute particles it is removed from the
fire, and a quantity of the cold whey, which had been
drained off, is added to the mixture to assist the curd
in forming in a mass at the bottom, where it is gathered
and squeezed with the disc of the rotilla. It is then
loosened and drawn to the surface, where it is collected
in a cheese cloth, and lifted out into a mould and there
left in its wet state for an hour. After this it is placed,
in a box made of beech and bound with hoops. A cloth
is placed over it, and a wooden follower, upon the top
of which heavy weights are laid. In this state the whey
is pressed out ; bu.t, after a few hours, it is again dipped
in the whey, but returned to the mould after being
enveloped in buckram, — this, by means of the pressure,
giving the cheese the peculiar print which is always
seen upon its crust. After some hours it is salted and
then dipped in salt water and again pressed between
the boards. The salting process is continued every
other day for a fortnight, when it is taken to the curing-
room and occasionally scraped, being finally well rubbed
with oil. Parmesan takes a considerable time to ripen,
hence the poorer makers sell to merchants who have
splendidly equipped cellars for the purpose. In one such
cellar near Parma we saw cheese valued at some ten
thousand pounds.

There is a cheese made in various parts of Italy

140

THE DAIEY OP THE FAEM.

similar to the whey cheeses which are made in two or
three EngHsh comities. This is called Eicotta. The
cm:d, if we may so call the solids obtained from the
whey, is the solid matter remaining in the milk after
the extraction of the casein and fat. This is sometimes
placed in a vessel of cold water, well shaken, and after-
wards pressed with the hand. In half-an-hour the sm:-
face of the water is covered with a scum. This is the
fat or butter of the ricotta. In making the cheese, the
whey is boiled, a httle of the sour whey from the last
making being first added. In this process, a scum also
rises, which may be used at once in the form of butter,
or converted into a regular cheese. It may be improved
by several modes of salting and curing, or by the addi-
tion of sweet milk or cream.

SWITZEELAND.

Dairy farming in Switzerland is an important
national industry; but in the mountainous cantons
which are shut off from the outer world for almost
half the year, where the cattle graze, and the cheeses
are made at an altitude of some 7,000 feet, the system
is exceedmgly primitive. In these districts it is
customary for one or two men to take the entire
cattle of the village to the mountains for the
summer, to live with them, milk them, and make
the cheeses, a hut being provided for the purpose.
Once a month the owners below visit the herds and
test the quantity of each cow's yield ; by this means
the cheese is ultimately divided, and the herdsmen

FOEKIGN DAIBTING.

141

paid. In the more fertile cantons, such as Zurich,
Zug, Lucerne, and Schwytz, the young cattle are
grazed upon the mountains, but most of the cows are
housed the whole year round, getting grass during
summer and hay during winter, cake and corn feeding
being almost unknown to the farmers. The milk is
usually set for cream in shallow wooden vessels, for
almost every dairy utensil is made of wood in
Switzerland. The cream is churned sweet, the chm-ns
resembling a Crruyere cheese or a small millstone in
shape, and they are consequently difficult to manipulate
and impossible to clean. The butter is exceedingly
mild and seldom salted, but it must be eaten fresh, for
it will not keep. In cheese-making, unless in the
factories and on the best farms, the milk is turned by
a primitive kind of rennet made of vinegar and sour
whey, in which pieces of bread are soaked ; and if we
except the very beautiful copper cheese kettles, the
finest appUance of the kind which we know, there are
no good dairy utensils made in the country. The
principal cheeses are — Emmenthaler, which we call
Gruyere ; Gruyere, which in the country is often a real
skim milk cheese ; Vacherin ; and Schabzieger.

Emmentlialer. — In the manufacture of this cheese,
the milk must be at a temperature of from 93° to 96°
F. If, however, it is extra rich, it may be a degree
higher, whereas for poor milk it should be a degree
lower. Again, as in summer cooling is slower than in
winter, it is not necessary that the temperature should
be quite so high. The quantity of rennet added is
usually 3 lbs. to 650 or 700 lbs. of milk, this rennet how-

142

THE DAIRY OF THE FARM.

ever, being specially prepared by eacb maker. At the
expiration of from 20 to 40 minutes the curd has be-
come firm and manipulation then commences. In the
first place it is cut through slowly and regularly with a
wooden knife called a sabre de bois, which reaches to
the bottom of the kettle. It is then left for a short
time for the whey to divide from the curd, and after-
wards heated afresh to a much higher temperature
before it is again cut up. The breaking of the curd
continues for some time, until at last, the whey being
removed, it gets harder, and forms into small grains.
The operator then takes a large cloth, stretches a metal
band across one end, and this he dips to the very
bottom of the kettle beneath the curd, which is in-
geniously gathered into the cloth. The metal band is
then disengaged, the four corners of the cloth affixed to
a hook suspended over the vat, and the whole is imme-
diately swung across and dropped into the centre of a
huge Gi-uyh-e hoop which is placed upon a table. Here
it is worked into shape, cleverly covered with dry
cloths, the hoop pulled tightly, and the cheese well
bound within it. It is then placed in the cheese press,
where it remains for about three hours, a pressure of
eighteen pounds being given for each pound of
cheese. After this it is taken out and provided with
clean cloths and again pressed, the changing of the
cloths taking place four, five, and even six times during
the day. The next morning the cheese is again taken
out and placed upon a table for salting, being first well
scraped or pared. The salt is laid upon the surface,
and well brushed in with a brush provided for the pur-
pose, about 4 lbs. of salt being used for 100 lbs. of cheese.

FOREIGN DAIRYING.

143

It is then taken to the cheese-room and placed upon a
shelf, and here it is that it is either perfected or spoiled,
for if the temperature is too low it becomes hard and
solid, and if too high it swells, and large holes are
formed within. If, however, the maker tests each
cheese with his finger daily, there is little fear of any
being spoiled. Good Emmenthaler or Gruyere, as the
same cheese is called in France, where it is also made,
is one of the choicest products of the dairy.

Gruyere. — Gruyere in Switzerland is a half -fat
cheese, the evening's milk being skimmed and then
added to the milk of the morning, the latter being
heated to a temperatm-e of 110° F. before the addition
of the evening's milk, so that the mean tempera-
tm"e of the mixture is about 93° F. before the
rennet is added. ' The system of adding rennet is con-
trolled by a simple experiment which the maker em-
ploys, adding one spoonful to three spoonfuls of milk
before the bulk of the milk is touched. If this minute
quantity sets in sixty to eighty seconds, all well and
good, and he is satisfied of the strength of the rennet.
As a general rule, the proportion is 1 part of rennet to
140 parts of milk. "When set, the curd is cut, as in
the case of the Emmenthaler. The remainder of the
system of manufacture very much resembles that des-
cribed above. A hundred pounds of milk usually make
nine to eleven pounds of Emmenthaler cheese, or six
to eight pounds of the poorer Gruyere.

Vacherin. — The Vacherin cheese is chiefly made in
Canton Fribourg. New milk is heated to a temperature

144

THE DAIEY OF THE FARM.

of 100° to 104° F., and after the curd has set it is
gently divided with a net made for the purpose, and
left for an hour, when the whey will be found at the
top of the vessel. This is then baled out and the curd
placed in a mould, in which it is left to drain for fifteen
minutes, being wrapped in a cloth and slightly pressed.
The cheese is turned, and the cloth changed four times
during the day, in order that the whey may be com-
pletely pressed out or absorbed. It is taken out of the
mould the next day, and laid upon a clean cloth and
left to dry and ripen, being turned and the cloth
changed every second day.

Schabzieger.— This cheese, which is famous in some
parts of Switzerland, is chiefly made from the albumi-
nous portion of the milk called sere; and, strange to
say, the more completely the milk is skimmed the more
successful is the manufacture of the cheese. The milk
is heated until boiling point, when a quantity of cold
butter-milk is added, little by little. Next a small
quantity of azi—a, prepared sour butter-milk— -is added,
and the mixture removed from the fire. Coagulation
having now taken place, the mass is stirred with a large
spoon, and after being allowed to stand for a short time
the sohd portion is taken out and placed in boxes pre-
pared for the purpose, pressed, and then subjected to a
heat of 60° F. in order to start fermentation. This is
but the beginning of the manufacture, for it is allowed
to ferment for some weeks, when the cheese is ground
and salted, and a small quantity of a herb named Meli-
lotus ccerulea, which is finely pulverised, added, to
impart the well-known flavour of the zieger. Tha

FOEEIGN DAIRYING.

145

cheese is now beaten, and made up into very small
conical shapes. It is estimated that thirty pounds of
skim-milk will make three and a half pounds of Schab-
zieger, which is not eaten as is ordinary cheese, but
mixed with butter and spread upon bread.

Since the above lines were written we have
frequently pointed out that the leading varieties of
cheese which we import from the Continent can be
made as perfectly in Great Britain as in their
respective countries. Dairy farmers do not, however,
embrace the opportunity, somid and unmistakable as it
is. But foreigners have been over to us to learn
to make Cheddar and Stilton, and efforts are already
being made to produce Continental Cheddar for the
British market ; while we British Dairy Farmers on our
side, so far from manufactiiring Gruyere, Parmesan,
and Camembert for export, do not attempt to produce
either for our own consumption. We have shown the
way by precept and in practice ; more we cannot do.

INDEX.

Abortion, 46

Accommodationforeheese-ma]ring,79

Acre, stock imd produce per, 1 1

Adulteration of milk, 59

Age and character of dairy cows, 41

Arable dairy farms, 94

Artificial foods, 27

Ass milk, 54

Ayrshire cow, 39

Backstein cheese, 31
Brewers' grains, 28
Brie cheese, 81
Butter, 61

— composition of, 61_

— consumption of, 15

— imports, 15

— making, 61

— yield, 7

Cabbages, 25

Cakes, oil, 28

Calf, treatment of, 51

Camembert cheese, 118

Carrots, 26

Casein, 4

Cheddar cheese, 74
Cheese, 72

— accommodation for, 79

— analyses of, 72

— Brie, 84, 108

— Cheddar, 74

— Cheshire, 77

— composition of, 72_

— consumption of, 15

— Coulommiers, 84, 110

— cream, 85

— Derbyshire, 79

— French, 106

— Gloucester, 79

— imports, 15

— insects affecting, 88

— making, 73

— Mignou or Gervais, 85

— room, 79

— sage, 86

Cheese, skimmed milk, 85

— soft, 83

— Stilton, 80

— utensils for making, 85

— "Wensleydale, S3

— yield, 10
Cheddar Cheese, 74
Cheshire cheese, 77
Churning, 69
Churns, 69

Clean milking, 96
Clover, 23

Composition of butter, 61

— milk, 63

Cooley system, the, 66
Cotentin breed of cows, 103
Coulommiers cheese, 84, 110
Cow, food of, 16

Cow, choice and treatment of, 36
Cowhouse, 43
Cream, 62
Creamometer, 53
Cream cheese, 85

Crops and foods for dairy stock, 22
Cropping land for the cow, 30

— — a dairy farm, 94
Curd formation, 73
— mill, 87

Daiky, the, 57

— breeds, 36

— examples, 5

— farms, cropping of, 94

— relations of food to, 20

— statistics, 3

— stock, crops and food for, 22
Dairying or grazing, 89
Denmark dairying, 97
Derbyshire cheese, 79

Drop after calving, 48
Drying the cow, 47
Dutch cattle, 39

— cheese, 133

— — Edam, 133

— — Qouda, 134

— dairying, 132

INDEX.

P.DAM cheese, 133
Einmenthgler cheese, 141
Ensilage, 29
Ergot, 46
Ewe's milk, 64

Pood and produce, 20
Food of cow, 16
Foods for dairy stock, 22
Foot-and-mouth disease, 48
Foreign daii-ying, 97

— Denmark, 97

— France, 102

— Sweden & Norway, 100
iTrench cheeses, 106

— — Brie, 108

— ■ — Coulommiers, 110

— — Camembert, 118

— — Gerome, 110

— — Journiac, 114

— — Livarot, 112

— — Miguot, 121

— — Mont d'Or, 115

— — Neufchatel, 116

— — Pont I'EvSque, 122
• — — Roquefort,116

— — St. Marcellin, 125

— — St. Kemy, 126

General management, 89
■Gentleness and punctuality, 96
German dairying, 128

— — cheese, 130

— — Backstein, 131

— _ Hartz kiise, 130

— — Limburg, 130
'G6rome cheese, 110
Olo'ster cheese, 79

Goat milk, 54
Gorgonzola cheese, 137
Gorse, 24
■Gouda cheese, 134
Grains, 28

•Grazing or dairying, 89
Gruyere cheese, 143
Guernsey cattle, 38
— produce, 7

Haetz kiise, 130
Hay, 23

Health of Cows, 45
Holland, 132
Hoveu, 48
Husk or hoose, 47

Implements, 63

Imports of dairy produce, 15
Insects aifecting cheese, 88
Introduction, 1
Italian buttermaking, 135

— cheese, 137

— — Gorgonzola, 137

— — Parmesan, 138
Italian rye-grass, 24

Italy, 135

Jeesey cattle, 38

— produce, 7
Joumiao cheese, 114

Kerry cattle, 40
Kohl rabi, 26

Lactometer, 53
Land, cropping of, 30
Limburg cheese, 130
Linseed, 27
Livarot cheese, 112
Lucerne, 24

Malt Culms, 28
Mangel wurzel, 26
Mare's milk, 54
Margarine, 69

— imports of, 15
Meal, 27

Mignon cheese, 85
Mignot cheese, 121
Milk, 53
— • adulteration of, 59

— analysis of, 54

— composition of, 53

— condensed, 56

— flavour of, 58

— profitable use of, 91
— ■ sale, 96

— yield of, 5
Milking, 49

— machine, 67
Molasses, 28
Mont d'Or cheese, 115

NeOTOHATEL cheese, 116

Oleo-maroarine, 59

Parmesan cheese, 138
Parsnips, 26
Pasturage, 22
Pleuro-pneumonia, 48
Pont I'Evfique cheese, 122

148

INDEX.

Potatoes, 26

Profitable use of milk, 91
Purging, 48

QUAKTER-rLL, 47

BArE, 24

Ked poll cattle, 38

Bed-water, 48

Eelatiou of food to dairy produce, 20
Eemedies for ill-tasted butter, 68
Boquefort cheese, 116
Eye, 23

Saoe cheese, 86
Sainfoin, 24

St. Marcellin cheese, 125
St. Bemy cheese, 126
Salt, 29

Schabzieger cheese, 144
Schemes of cultivation, 30
Scour, 48
Separators, 66
Shorthoni cattle, 36
Skim-milk cheese, 85
Skin diseases, 49
Soft cheese, 83
Sore Teats, 49
Statistics, dairy, 3
Stilton cheese, 80
Stock and produce, II, 13

Straw, 26
Summer food, 16
Swartz system, 129
Sweden and Norway, 100
Switzerland, 140
Swiss cheese, 141

— — Emmenthaler, 141

— — Gruyere, 143

— — Schabzieger, 144

— — Vacherin, 143

Tastb of milk, 58
Treatment of the cow, 43
- — caU, 51
Truckle cheese, 82
Turnips, 25

XJtenshs for Cheese Dairy, St

Vaohekin cheese, 143
Vetches, 23

Warts, 49
Water-supply, 44
Wensleydale cheese, 83
Winter food, 16
Woman's milk, 54

Yield of butter, 7

— cheese, 10

— milk, 5

JUDD AND CO., LIMITED, PRINTERS, DOCTORS* COMSIOSS, LONDOK, E.(J.

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