PACKING BUTTER FOR MARKET. 303 



This was my first season of making butter. I have as good a 

 butter room as I could arrange, but I found, after the weather 

 became somewhat hot, that the sun struck upon one side of the 

 building so that the boards were quite warm. I cut a large 

 quantity of black and white birches, and placed them against 

 two sides of my butter room, to prevent the sun from striking 

 it. I have windows on all sides, and those were let down. 

 This, you will remember, was in extremely hot weather ; so 

 much so, that I kept the windows open night and day, except 

 in the middle of the day, when they were shut. It worked ad- 

 mirably, and I was very well pleased for a few days. But after 

 the birches became wilted, one foggy, damp morning, as I passed 

 into the butter room, I noticed that I smelt the birches very 

 plainly. I thought the cream might partake of that flavor. I 

 skimmed and tasted some of the cream, and true enough, the 

 birch was there, and in the cream that adhered to the pan, I 

 could taste it as plainly as you could if you chewed the twigs. 

 I thought I was stuck, sure. I was making some 120 or 130 

 pounds a week at that time. We churned the butter as usual, 

 and to my surprise, the buttermilk had that flavor, but I could 

 not detect it in the butter. The butter came to Boston to Mr. 

 Hovey, and I got my usual price. There was not a word said 

 about anything wrong in that lot. That satisfied me that cream 

 is not so sensitive as butter. I thought that was very good 

 proof that the butter globules did not receive that odor, so that 

 when they broke, the buttermilk took the flavor. 



Now, in regard to transporting butter. My whole aim is to 

 keep it from the air. I do not want any kind of air to reach it. 

 If it is pure air, it will abstract the sweet flavor ; if it is bad 

 air, it will do harm, of course. I cover it from the air from the 

 time it is salted until it is worked. Then it is boxed as soon as 

 it can be, and covered. I have three different sizes of boxes. 

 My shipping-box is something like an old-fashioned tool-chest, 

 and holds four boxes of thirty pounds each. The shipping-box 

 is two boxes high and two boxes wide. They are the common 

 round butter boxes, but the shipping-box is a square box, with 

 handles at each end. A rod comes up at each end, and there is 

 a thumb-screw outside on the cover. Listing, such as comes on 

 the sides of cloth, is tacked around the edge of the box. When 

 the cover is screwed down, the box is pretty tight. You will 



