88 VERMONT AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 



qualified to make good goods or to command good prices that 

 he would hesitate to eat himself, which would leave the ques- 

 tion of fine goods entirely with the maker. 



This question of good milk is like thrashing old straw, it 

 has been hurled at the dairymen from the platform and 

 through the dairy press for years. There is nothing new 

 about it yet the exigency is so great, the trade so exacting, it 

 should be held up to him every time he milks a cow. Dairy- 

 men do know and understand the importance of care and 

 painstaking in the handling of milk, yet somehow, or some 

 way, many, very many do not seem to understand what con- 

 stitutes good, sound milk. It is milk from healthy cows, well 

 cared for, the stables where the milking is done ventilated 

 and kept clean and dry as possible by the use of absorbents, 

 such as straw, sawdust, land plaster, and the persons doing 

 the milking shall be cleanly in their habits, ever bearing in 

 mind that filth once in the milk is always thereafter there, 

 and in every way avoid exciting the cows, and finally the 

 milk put into clean utensils and cooled down to a point where 

 the development of undesirable bacteria will be checked. This 

 is a simple method and requires no special effort. 



The extreme competition in the business, the employment 

 of men and boys at the stations who are incompetent to judge 

 milk have in some localities caused the farmers to become 

 careless and indifferent in the care of milk, which is the 

 means of lowering the standard of Vermont products. This 

 has become a condition and a fact which the factories and 

 dairymen will be obliged to meet. The conditions pertaining 

 to the manufacture of fine butter and cheese should be thor- 

 oughly understood by every dairyman. Like every article of 

 food manufactured the very essence of success lies in the raw 

 material, milk being an article of food when you offer it for 

 sale at the creamery, cheese factory, or anywhere else. Your 

 self-interest, the consumer and the laws of your state have 

 a right to demand that it be clean, pure and wholesome. 



I believe we as Vermonters are somewhat vain and self- 

 conceited in our estimation of our abilities on dairying and 

 inclined to follow old ruts. Nature having placed at our 

 disposal the means whereby we can and do excel, we seem to 

 think because we are in Vermont no one can approach us; but 

 we are going to get this conceit badly shattered before we are 

 aware of it unless we open our eyes to the fact that there is a 

 struggle for first place. The effort to keep the lead must be 

 through practical dairy education. 



But a short time ago Canada was not considered by us a 

 competitor. Many of us remember quotations of "Western 

 Reserve," but the quotations were so low compared with our 



