STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 519 



other circumstances, as experience and good judgment seem 

 to dictate. 



We notice tliat the rules by which many of our makers profess 

 to be guided, are imperfectly understood; some claim to salt one 

 common tea cup of salt to 15 lbs. curd; others, one cup to 20 

 lbs. curd, and others again, one cup of salt to 15 lbs. pressed 

 cheese; and yet we found but very few dairymen who frequently 

 and accurately weighed either salt or cheese, and on trial we 

 found the common tea cup of salt to vary from five to eight ozs. 

 While we totally repudiate the idea that a given set of rules 

 should be adhered to in all cases, we are decidedly of the opin- 

 ion that the common rules on the subject should be more precisely 

 understood, and practiced with more discrimination. We think 

 it would pay our cheese makers to use the Rock, or Syracuse 

 evaporated salt, instead of the common barrel salt in so gene- 

 ral use. 



The dairy of cheese to which we award the first premium, 

 Clift Eames, Rutland, contains 27 cows. The milking barn, 

 dairy house and utensils are at once simple and convenient. It 

 is scalded with whey, gradually, up to 100^ to 110*^, salted five 

 ounces of salt to 20 pounds pressed cheese, and is put to press 

 cold. Very great importance is attached by the maker to cooling 

 the curd well before pressing, he being decidedly of the opinion 

 that putting to press warm has a tendency to injure the flavor of 

 the cheese. It is but just, however, to say that this theory is 

 repudiated by other makers, perhaps equally good. We find 

 every cheese in shape, in boxes, firm, but not too hard, and 

 mild and uniform in flavor. Your committee were not sharp 

 enough to detect in it the usual complement of indifferent cheese 

 and were entirely unanimous in awarding it the first prize. 



The 2d, G. W. Parker, Watertown; 3d, II. Hopkins and J. J. 

 Evans, Rutland; 4th, 1). Hamlin and E. Lusee, Jxutland, and 

 indeed others to whicli nu premiums are awarded, are prime 

 dairies and each have so many good points that it is diflicult to 

 discriminate between them. 7'here are some which we sliall be 

 glad to set down as No. 2, })iit we suj)})ose a sound discretion will 

 hardly achuit of it, to say nothing (;f tlie rules of the Scx^iety. 



Gentlemen, there are some nicx)ted questions in agricultural 

 science — some jKjints about which well-informed men honestly 



