MANAGEMENT OF THE DAIRY. 255 



CHAPTER XXYI. 



ECONOMY OF THE HOUSEHOLD. 



926. The success and profit of any farming enterprise 

 will in many cases depend very much upon the thrifty 

 and judicious management of matters within the house. 

 The exercise of skill, prudence and good judgment on the 

 part of the farmer s wife, is called for in a thousand ways. 



927. Take the dairy as an example. Costly barns, well- 

 selected cows and judicious feeding in the butter or 

 cheese dairy are of little avail, if the products are to be 

 depreciated in value by imperfect modes of preparing 

 them for market, where the final judgment is to be pro 

 nounced upon them, and the price will vary according to 

 their quality. 



928. The care of milk forms so important a part of the 

 duties of every housekeeper, and it enters so largely into 

 many processes of cooking in every household, that its 

 character and properties should be well understood. 



929. Milk is an opaque fluid of a whitish color with a 

 sweet and agreeable taste, and is composed chiefly of 

 casein e or curd, which gives it its strength, and from 

 which cheese is made ; an oily substance which gives it 

 richness, and which is separated in the form of cream and 

 butter ; a sugar of milk which gives it sweetness, and a 

 watery substance which makes it refreshing as a beverage, 

 and which is separated from the other constituents in 

 cheese making, and known as whey. 



930. The fatty matter in pure milk varies from two 

 and a half to six and a half per cent., the caseous or 



