ALCOHOL ON BUTTER, IO/ 



and circumstances the small amount of alcohol (which is 

 found in the Ensilage) passes before it can reach the 

 butter. 



In the first place, the alcohol is only an incident to the 

 great change which has been taking place in the Ensi- 

 laged forage. This change, which is so important and so 

 useful, is the conversion of the starch contained in the 

 plants into sugar. The formation of alcohol is only a 

 nutritive barometer which tells us that sugar has been 

 formed. The odor of alcohol is hardly perceptible until 

 after the Ensilage has been exposed to the action of the 

 oxygen of the atmosphere twelve to twenty-four hours. 



Therefore, if the professor is correct, it is in the power 

 of the dairyman to prevent the formation of alcohol by 

 feeding direct from the Silo without allowing the alco- 

 holic fermentation to take place. Thus, if an evil, it is 

 easily avoided. 



In the second place, the small amount of alcohol pres- 

 ent in the Ensilage (I have never seen any of my cows 

 intoxicated) is mixed with the saliva during the process 

 of mastication, and passes with the Ensilage into the 

 first stomach, or paunch, thence into the second stomach. 

 It is then re-masticated by chewing the cud, and passes 

 into the third stomach, thence into the fourth stomach, 

 where it is digested. 



When cows are fed upon Ensilage, I have noticed 

 that their breath is particularly sweet, as if fed upon the 

 sweetest grasses. From the stomach it passes into the 

 intestines, from which that part of their contents neces- 

 sary for the nourishment of the animal economy is taken 

 up by two sets of vessels ; first, the blood-vessels of the 

 intestines, and passes through the portal vein to the 

 liver. There the portal vein is divided and subdivided 

 into an infinity of minute branches as they reach the lit- 



