112 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



ing largely along the line of farm crops. I am glad that some 

 one has instituted this work in the Maine State Dairymen's 

 Association and I hope it will continue, and that in the course 

 of ten years there will be many good varieties of com being 

 grown in this State. 



THE ESSENTIALS IN MAKING AND MARKETING 



DAIRY BUTTER. 

 By L. W. Dyer, Cumberland Center. 



To the farmer who has had the opportunity of coming in 

 direct contact with the consumer, little need be said on the first 

 half of this subject — the necessity of making his butter good. 

 On the making of good butter depends the prosperity, the very 

 income, of the farmer who keeps cows for the production of 

 milk. The consumer of butter has the right to dictate to the 

 maker what kind of butter he shall make for him, for he is the 

 man that pays the price. The farmer has been too slow to 

 realize this. He has gone right ahead and made butter good, 

 bad, and indififerent, assuming that the consumer has no choice 

 in the matter, and would have to take what there was to be had. 

 But as population has grown and consumers of butter multi- 

 plied, the demand for good butter has become more and more 

 insistent, and today is so earnest that the effort of every farmer, 

 and every butter maker, must be strongly enlisted in producing 

 the only grade of butter wanted, the premium-taken brand, 

 good butter. "Bring us good butter," is the demand from the 

 consumer to the butter producer. The necessity of making a 

 gilt edged article is seen in the satisfaction that good butter 

 gives the guests at the table ; it is seen in that relishable whole- 

 someness of cooked food that only good butter can impart; it 

 is noted again in the request of the housewife shopping at the 

 store and invariably asking for "the best" quality. 



There is no greater necessity in the dairy world today than 

 that of making good butter. So great is the necessity for good 

 butter that the national government has established colleges 

 where students may be taught those things that are needful to 



