CATTLE THE DAIRY. 859 



it in manufacture. The care and feeding of cows to secure 

 profitable returns of milk, the continuance of the flow, the study 

 of the market, and a purpose to place before the consumer the 

 exact product called for, are at the foundation of the dairy in- 

 dustry. Beyond this lies the department of mechanical skill, a 

 knowledge of the manipulation of milk, and its results of butter 

 and cheese, that a perfect article shall be placed upon the market. 



To accomplish this, dairying is naturally divided into two 

 great departments, individual and co-operative. The advan- 

 tages of co-operation in dairying are that the labor is greatly 

 reduced, as in the factory two or three hands will easily man- 

 ufacture the milk of several hundred cows; and while here and 

 there in a private dairy a better article of butter will be made, 

 and better prices realized, as a general rule the factory will 

 excel in both price and quality, and the patron receive the 

 cash, while the family dairy will often be obliged to barter at 

 the grocery. As long as the products of the dairy were very 

 largely of local consumption, the manufacture of butter and 

 cheese would be an individual industry; but when they became 

 a matter of extended commerce, method and system would follow 

 as a result, and from this would come a massing of material 

 first, to produce as uniform a result as possible ; and, second, to 

 reduce the cost of production to its lowest limit. To this end, 

 since 1868, we find all sorts of associate dairying springing 

 up co-operative, patron, cream-gathering, milk-buying, and other 

 kindred ways, each system and plan having variations of its 

 own to suit the locality in which operations are carried on. 



The new methods at once called for yet larger dairies, and 

 the great demand for the better and more uniform quality of 

 goods called for a great increase of dairy territory, and now 

 not only the original dairy districts of New York and Ohio, but 

 nine or ten other States are largely engaged in the dairy in- 

 dustry, and the butter and cheese of the United States, instead 

 of being articles of local consumption, find their way into every 

 market on the globe. 



Milk. The discussion of the different systems of conduct- 

 ing the dairy industry of this country can better be understood by 



