526 BOARD OF AGKIOULTURE. 



take it all out. This prevails all over the country. I am satisfied it is 

 largely the want of education in the business. 



The President: Mr. Knox, what is your reason for the situation? 



Mr. Knox: Mr. President, I don't linow that I am able to assign any 

 special reason. The reasons to my mind are general. Of course, the high 

 price of feed is one reason that it is depressed. Another reason is the in- 

 ferior butter that is made and put on the market. Other reasons are the 

 means that are used in artificially building up the pi'oducts— as was ex- 

 pressed last night, in cream built up artificially. Cream is now made 

 where there is no cream. It is supposed to be cream, but it is not cream. 

 Another great trouble is the oleomargarine trade. The process butter 

 trade has a great deal to do with the depression in the butter trade. The 

 reasons are general. There are no special reasons why it should be de- 

 pressed. Another reason is that the beef prices have been so high within 

 the last five years that it has driven a great many men from tlie butter 

 interests. 



Mr. Drischel: One of the greatest depressions with the creameries 

 and cheese factories of this State is, the farmers are getting in goooL cir- 

 'cumstances. They are either going to the towns and cities, or tiiey are 

 retiring to a certain extent, and the tenants that are placed upon the 

 farm are restricted to two or three cows. I can cite you an instance of 

 a man owning several hundred acres of land where there is not a tenant 

 that has more than four or five cows; and one of the causes of the de- 

 pression is that the tenant does not have time to develop the herd, or have 

 ample time to stay on the farm. 



Mr. Burnside: Did you gentlemen ever think now that oleomargarine 

 has more to do with the depression of the price of butter than anything 

 else? You go into the market and the people will do one of two things. 

 They will either buy first-class creamery butter or they will buy oleo- 

 margarine. Today, if you pass that Grout Bill or something like it, it 

 will do more to boom the price of dairy products in this country than any- 

 thing else. It has more to do than anything else, because people would 

 rather eat oleomargarine than poor butter. 



The Pi'esideut: I will give you a receipt that will do more to pro- 

 mote the dairy interests on the farms than anything else, and that is clean- 

 liness. It is the hottest proposition that can be put against the Grout Bill, 

 and if the farmers would pursue as heavy a campaign on cleanliness as 

 they do on Congressmen and Representatives they would carry it. 



The Secretary: I find, in visiting the dairy sections, one thing that 

 has depressed the dairy interests and that is the extravagant and un- 

 reasonable prices that have been paid for creameries in this State. They 



