VARIOUS METHODS OF SETTING MILK. 73 



Mr. Burnett. I think if I had time I could make a 

 success of it; but 1 should be obliged to have a machine 

 made on purpose. Mr. Weston was so much pleased with 

 it, that he said he would make me a machine. I do not 

 know exactly what I should want ; I should have to spend 

 more time on it. I do not think it is a success at present. 



Question. How strong a brine do you wash your butter 

 in? 



Mr. BuENETT. Full solution of brine. I am not so very 

 particular about it. This globular butter has so little affinity 

 for salt, that Col. Allerton, of the National Dairyman's Asso- 

 ciation, told me, when he was on here from Chicago, that 

 they put butter into barrels in that way, and you could 

 scarcely taste the salt after the butter had lain in brine three 

 months, because there was no affinity between the butter 

 * and the brine. We run the brine in at about the tempera- 

 ture we want to work the butter. 



Question. Why do you use the brine at all ? Why not 

 use fresh water ? 



Mr. Buenett. Because almost all water contains more 

 or less impurities, and salt neutralizes those impurities. You 

 never need fear that the brine will affect your butter. 



Question. Don't you salt your butter after you wash it 

 in brine ? 



Mr. Buenett. Yes : this brine does not salt the butter 

 at all. 



Question. You have to break the globules to salt your 

 butter ? 



Mr. Buenett. Yes : then we form a compact mass of 

 butter. I like very much to have my butter salted, and laid 

 away for five hours. If butter can be laid away from four 

 to seven hours, the salt permeates the mass, gradually dis- 

 solves, and is ready to work up ; and the grain of the butter 

 is set as firmly as it is at the end of twenty-four hours. At 

 the end of twenty-four hours, if }'our butter is put away in 

 a cold place, it is very hard to work it, and very difficult, as 

 every expert knows, to work it up without destroying the 

 grain. 



Mr. Cheevee. You would prefer to finish it up at once ? 



Mr. Buenett. Yes : I would rather finish my butter up, 

 and then leave it for twenty-four hours, and then let a green 

 hand or an ordinary man go through it, and crush it. 



