BUTTER. 



159 



ed in contact with atmospheric air, absorbed a consi- 

 v ' durable quantity of it. But l)i Young has shewn, 

 that butter may be obtained from cream by churn- 

 ing, without the contact of air. These two state- 

 ments, however, are not irreconcilable, since, ac- 

 cording to Fourcroy, the butyraceoua matter takes 

 its oxygen partly from the air, and partly from the 

 milk. That this matter should absorb oxygen, and 

 thereby acquire the consistence of butter, is quite 

 analogous to what happens to other oily bodies, 

 which all become thicker by absorbing the oxyge- 

 nous principle. The gas disengaged is probably the 

 carbonic ncid gas ; for every person must have ob- 

 served, that when even sour cream is churned, the 

 butter obtained is perfectly sweet ; and the milk re- 

 maining in the churn, called the butter-milk, is al- 

 ways much less sour than the cream had been. 



Though butter is obtained usually by agitating 

 cream, it may be also got by agitating milk as drawn 

 from the cow, and even in greater quantity than from 

 the cream alone of the same milk ; a fact well known 

 to those who superintend dairies. Even whey, by 

 churning, yields butter. In the agricultural report 

 before quoted, it is stated, that 27 Scotch pints of 

 whey, that is, about 108 English, afford at an ave- 

 rage one pound of butter. The oily part of the 

 milk appears to have so strong an attraction for the 

 other ingredients, that it never completely separates 

 from them. 



Butter can be obtained from cream, when sweet 

 and newly taken from the milk ; but it then requires, 

 according to Fourcroy, four times as much churn- 

 ing as after it hns become sour by standing. It ap- 

 pears, therefore, that by being kept, cream acquires 

 new properties, in consequence of which, it can be 

 with greater facility converted into butter. This can 

 by no means be equally well obtained from the milk 

 or every sort of animal. Indeed, the milk of some 

 of them can never be made to yield any butter. No 

 length of churning will produce it from the cream, 

 of woman's milk, or of mare's milk ; while, on the 

 contrary, the cream of goat's milk, and ewe's milk, 

 yield it in abundance, and with as much facility as 

 the crram of the milk of the cow, from which it is 

 almost always made. The cream of asses milk, when 

 long agitated, yields a soft, white, insipid butter, 

 which has the singular property of again mixing ve- 

 ry readily with the butter milk, and of being capable 

 to be again separated from it, by agitating the con- 

 taining vessel under cold water. 



When butter is kept for a certain time, it acquires 

 a peculiar disagreeable smell and taste, known by the 

 name of rancidity. This has been thought to arise 

 from the dtvelopement of a peculiar acid, similar to, 

 if not the same with, the sebacic acid. But Deyeux 

 and Parmentier have shewn, that no acid is present 

 in rancid butter. Rancid oils, however, certainly 

 do shew acid properties. The disposition of butter 

 to become rancid, is owing in a good measure to the 

 presence of foreign matters adhering to it ; for if the 

 butter be carefully washed, so as to separate com- 

 pletely the serous and curdy parts, rancidity does 

 not take place nearly so soon. 



When butter is distilled, we obtain a little water 

 and sebacic acid : the greatest part of the butter 



conies over in the state of an oil, with a strong, 

 pungent, and very disagreeable smell ; much carbu- 

 rated hydrogen gas is disengaged, and there remains 

 in the retort a very mall carbonaceous residuum, 

 with a little phosphat of lime. 



The most approved modes of preparing butter, 

 the circumstances which influence its goodness, the 

 uses to which it is put, and the best methods of pre- 

 serving it, with its importance as an article of com- 

 merce, will be mentioned afterwards. Meanwhile, 

 we observe, that this substance seems to have been 

 very imperfectly, if at all, known to the ancients. 



The word butter is no doubt from the Latin bu- 

 ttjnnn, and that from the Greek y?vg<*, which is ge- 

 nerally stated to be a compound of the two words 

 ?, box, and 1w{, coagnlum : while others contend 

 that /3*1w{ is not of Greek origin, but derived from 

 the language of the Scythians, from whom the Greeks 

 first obtained the knowledge of butter. Certain it is, 

 that Hippocrates is the first Greek author who men- 

 tions /3Ji;gr. Speaking of the Scythians, he says, 

 " they pour the milk of their mares into wooden ves- 

 sels and shake it violently ; this causes it to foam, 

 and the fat part, which is light, rising to the surface, 

 becomes what they call butter (d /3&/t;g JwtAisir/)." 

 Herodotus also, who was cotemporary with him from 

 the year B. C. 459 to B. C. 4-13, particularly de- 

 scribes the process of making butter among the Scy- 

 thians. This affords a presumption that the article 

 was not then known among the Greeks, and that 

 they acquired the knowledge of /3g7vgf, and the prac- 

 tice of making it, from the Scythians. 



Some have imagined that they found butter men- 

 tioned in the writings of Moses, the book of Job, 

 and other parts of the most ancient sacred scrip- 

 tures. According to our translation, Abraham is 

 said, Gen. xviii. 8. to have taken butter and milk, 

 and the calf that had been dressed, to set before the 

 august strangers who visited him. And in the well- 

 known song, or historical ode of Moses, which he re- 

 cited in the hearing of the Israelites, a short time be- 

 fore his death, (Deut. xxxii. 14.) we have the words 

 " butter of kine." Butter is also mentioned in the 

 song of Deborah and Barak, Judges v. 'J5. Certain 

 friends (2 Sam. xvii. 29- ) are said to have brought 

 to Mahanaim, butter and other articles, for the re- 

 freshment of David and his army during the rebel- 

 lion of his son Absalom. Honey and butter are also 

 mentioned Job xx. 17 ; and in chap. xxix. 6. he says, 

 " When I washed my steps with buffer, and the rock 

 poured me out rivers of oil." Butter and honey are 

 also mentioned in the well-known passage in the 7th 

 chapter of Isaiah, where the prophet foretels of the 

 child, that he should eat butter and honey. And in 

 th: 30th chapter of the Proverbs it is said, the 

 churning of milk bringeth forth butter." But it is 

 to be observed, that in all these passages, the Hebrew 

 word is nxrarr, hcmelc, which biblical critics agree 

 in allowing to signify sour thick milk or cream. Be- 

 sides, it is plain that hemae alludes to something fluid, 

 for it was used to wash the feet. The error or sup- 

 posing hfmiie to mean a concrete substance like but- 

 ter, appears to have arisen from the Septuagint, who 

 translate the Hebrew term by ftilvpt, a word which, 

 as they lived in Egypt two centuries after Hippo- 



