114 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



have been discovered by scientists, are the unicellular plants 

 (in yeast called torida, or infusoria') found in water and other 

 liquids, are the formative power, changing, by molecular 

 action, meal into leavened bread, curd into cheese, and health 

 into disease ? Chemistry may yet determine. 



In our judgment, the entry of factory cheese on exhibition 

 was decidedly the poorest of the lot: the smell was rank, 

 and the taste very unpleasant. We hope this was not a fair 

 sample, or an average, of the cheese made at that factory. 

 There is, doubtless, a great difference in the quality of cheese 

 made at the various factories, and a difference in the taste 

 and judgment of people of a good or a poor cheese ; but one 

 thing is quite clear, that cheese made of milk from all sorts 

 of cows, with different feed, and coming from all quarters, — 

 the cows, perhaps, milked by unclean hands, their bags 

 besmeared with mud or manure, and the milk carried in 

 improper vessels, — cannot be expected (nor if every kind of 

 neatness was observed) to be equal to that made from one 

 dairy, in the neatest and most careful manner, by skilful 

 hands. A question may here arise, — after all the labor 

 claimed to be saved by the factory operation, is it, on the 

 whole, a benefit to individuals or the community ? May it not 

 be true that much of the time saved to women is not spent 

 in that which is conducive of health nor advantage ? ]\Iakino: 

 cheese too hard work for women ! Is not farm-labor too hard 

 work for men, as well ? Look through the community ; and 

 where do you find the strong muscle, the ruddy cheek, the 

 sparkling eye, the cheerful spirit ? Is it not among the wives 

 and daughters of farmers, and dairy farmers too ? " Early 

 to bed, and early to rise," daily labor with social diversions, 

 is the surest road to health and enjoyment. If more of our 

 women, and men too, would follow this rule, there would be 

 fewer invalids, and less doctor's bills to pay. 



From the great value of butter and cheese, important 

 articles of food and sources of profit, and, as they may well 

 be called, luxuries which grace and crown the festal and fru- 

 gal tables of our land, and all other countries, too great impor- 

 tance cannot be given to this department of husbandry. The 

 committee would, therefore, not only recommend, but urge, 

 the importance of giving special encouragement to dairy 

 interests j so that our women — mothers and daughters, ladies 



