80 



ALIMENTATION. 



in rural districts. It is agreeable, easily digested, and con- 

 tains a considerable amount of nutriment. It is frequently 

 useful in therapeutics, when other nutritious articles are not 

 well borne. 



Butter. The only variety of butter used as food is that 

 inade from cows' milk ; from which it is extracted by mechan- 

 ically breaking up the oil globules, and causing their fusion into 

 a homogeneous mass. It usually contains about one-sixth of 

 its weight of buttermilk. 1 The best butter is made out of 

 rich milk of good flavor, and contains only the flavoring prin- 

 ciple of the cream, which is but slightly altered. In poor quali- 

 ties of butter, either the milk has been inferior, or the fatty 

 acids are freely developed. In this country butter is gener- 

 ally salted, but in many parts of Europe it is used fresh. It 

 is an exceedingly important article of diet in all parts of the 

 civilized world. . Its important, and almost its sole aliment- 

 ary principle, is fat, and it therefore demands no considera- 

 tion beyond that which has already been given to this class 

 of principles. 



Cheese. The coagulated nitrogenized constituents of 

 milk, combined with a greater or less quantity of butter and 

 inorganic salts, the more watery portions having been re- 

 moved by pressure, constitute the important article of food 

 called cheese. In this country, cheese is ordinarily so pre- 

 pared and protected that it will keep for a length of time, 

 and it becomes, in some instances, considerably improved by 

 age. Its manufacture constitutes an important branch of 

 industry in many sections, particularly those in which, from 

 the quality of the pasture, the milk is unusually rich and 

 well-flavored. In the ordinary form it is somewhat salted, 

 and pressed into immense cakes or disks. The alterations 



1 PEREIRA, Treatise on Food and Dlct^ edited by Charles A. Lee, M. D. New 

 York, 1843, p. 86. 



