A DEPLORABLE FACT. 141 



Board of Agriculture, might be profitably devoted to this 

 important matter of railway transportation ? 



Is it not about time for the farmers of Massachusetts to 

 suspend this apparently endless task of annually " saving the 

 country," and one year do something to save themselves? 



The remaining question in this matter of competition is 

 even more important than the others. Unless the dairy prod- 

 ucts sent to our markets from Massachusetts farms are at 

 least equal in quality with those which come from other 

 sections, it is not of much use to increase the product, or to 

 worry over transportation." A good quality of oleo-marga- 

 rine is infinitely preferable to an inferior quality of butter, 

 and can be made at half the cost. No one wants the prod- 

 uct of bad butter increased. The more poor butter and 

 cheese people make, the poorer are the makers, and the 

 poorer they ought to be. But with the large proportion of 

 well-bred cows that are to be found in this State, the abun- 

 dance of good grass and good water, and the favorable cli- 

 mate, one certainly might expect to find Massachusetts butter, 

 as a rule, fully as good as any other. Deplorable as it is, 

 such is not the fact. 



It is now several years since butter made within the State 

 has stood at the head of the list in the market reports. Of 

 course there are always a few makers, who have established 

 a reputation for their butter, that are able to sell at prices 

 considerably above the ruling market-rates. But the whole 

 of this " gilt-edged " butter, as it is often called, does not 

 amount to one per cent of the total quantity which dealers 

 handle in large places, and is never considered in the prices 

 stated in market reports. One day last summer I examined 

 and priced large quantities of butter in the hands of Boston 

 merchants. That from Western Massachusetts (and, remem- 

 ber, three-fourths of all the butter produced in the State is 

 made west of the city of Worcester) was selling there at 

 eight to fourteen cents a pound, the greater part at ten and 

 twelve cents ; and the makers generally received two cents 

 less than these prices. Butter from Vermont and Northern 

 New York was generally rated at twelve to fifteen cents, 

 and dairy tubs from the Western States the same. But the 

 products of New York and Illinois creameries sold readily 

 at sixteen and seventeen cents, and I saw one large lot from 



