1036 PRACTICE OF AGRICULTURE. Part III. 



milking, churning, and in short the whole internal regulation of the dairy, together with 

 the care of marketing the butter, where the same is made up wholly for home consump- 

 tion, falling alone upon the wife. In this department of rural economy, so large a 

 portion of skill, of frugality, cleanliness, industry, and good management, is required in 

 the wife, that without them the farmer may be materially injured. This observation will 

 indeed hold good in many other parts of business which pass through the hands of the 

 mistress in a farm-house ; but there is none wherein he may be so greatly assisted, or so 

 materially injured, by the good conduct or want of care in his wife, as in the dairy. The 

 dairy husbandry is more extensively and successfully pursued in England than in Scot- 

 land or in Ireland. " As to dairy husbandry on any thing like an improved plan," says 

 Aiton, " it is still confined to a mere corner of Scotland." This corner is the district 

 of Cunninghame, in Ayrshire, of which he observes : " The excellence of the improved 

 breed of cows in Ayrshire, as well as the superior quality of Strathaven veal, the Glasgow 

 butter and milk, and Dunlop cheese, to all others in Scotland, are things that cannot be 

 disputed." {Niton's Dairy Husbandry, Pref. p. 18.) We shall in giving the dairy hus- 

 bandry of England glance, at the same time, at the peculiarities of the Ayrshire dairy 

 husbandry, as given by the author last quoted. 



6977. The operations of the dairy in all its branches are still conducted perhaps more empirically than 

 those of any other department of husbandry, though it would appear that science, chemistry in particular, 

 might be applied to discover the principles, and regulate the practice, of the art, with facility and precision. 

 We have heard it admitted, an eminent author observes, even by experienced dairymen, that the quality 

 of their cheeses differs materially in the same season, and without being able to assign a reason. Every 

 one knows how different the cheese of Gloucester is from that of Cheshire, though both are made from 

 fresh milk, the produce of cows of the same breed, or rather, in both counties, of almost every breed, and 

 fed on pastures that do not exhibit any remarkable difference in soil, climate, or herbage. Even in the 

 same district, some of what must appear the most important points are far from being settled in practice. 

 Marshal, in his Rural Economy of Gloucestershire, has registered a number of observations on the heat 

 of the dairy-room, and of the milk when the rennet was applied in cheese-making; on the time required 

 for coagulation, and the heat of the whey after, which are curious, only because they prove that no uni- 

 form rule is observed in any of these particulars. The same discrepancy is observable in all the subsequent 

 operations till the cheese is removed from the press, and even afterwards in the drying room. One would 

 think the process of salting the cheeses the most simple of all; and yet it is sometimes, as in the west of 

 Scotland, mixed with the curd ; in other instances poured into the milk, in a liquid state, before being 

 coagulated ; and still more commonly, never applied at all till the cheeses are formed in the press, and 

 then only externally. In treating of the dairy, we shall first offer a few remarks on the nature of milk, 

 and the properties of that of different animals ; and next consider the dairy house and its furniture, milk, 

 ing, churning, cheese-making, and the different kinds of cheese, butters, creams, and other products of 

 the dairy. 



Sect. I. Chemical Principles of Milk, and the Properties of the Milk of different 



Animals. 



6978. The milk used by the human species is obtained from various animals, but chiefly the cow, ass, 

 ewe, goat, mare, and camel ; that in most general use in British dairying is the milk of the cow, which in 

 modern times has received great improvement in quantity as well as quality, by ameliorations in the form 

 of milch cows, in their mode of nourishment, and in the management of the dairy. Whatever be the 

 kind of animal from which milk is taken, its external character is that of a white opaque fluid, having a 

 sweetish taste, and a specific gravity somewhat greater than that of water. Newly taken from the animal, 

 and allowed to remain at rest, it separates into two parts; a thick white fluid called cream, which collects 

 on the surface in a thin stratum; and a more dense watery body, which remains below. The quantity 

 and quality of cream, and the time it requires to separate from the milk, vary according to the nature of 

 the milk and the temperature of the atmosphere. Milk which has stood some time after the separation of 

 the cream, first becomes acescent, and then coagulates. When the coagulum is pressed gently, a serous 

 fluid is forced out, and the remainder is the caseous part of milk, or pure cheese. 



6979. Butter, or solidified cream, one of the most valuable products of milk, is obtained artificially by 

 churning ; an operation analogous in its effects to shaking or beating, by which the cream separates from 

 the caseous part and serum, in a more solid form than when left to separate spontaneously. It is after- 

 wards rendered still more solid by beating with a wooden spatula. 



6980. Cheese is obtained by first coagulating the milk, either with, or deprived of, its cream, and then 

 expressing the serum or whey; the consolidated curd so produced forms cheese. The milk may be 

 coagulated in various ways, but that effect is chiefly produced by the use of rennet, which is prepared by 

 digesting the coat of young ruminating animals, especially that of the calf The rennet is poured into the 

 milk when newly brought from the cow, or the milk is warmed to 9(P or 1(X) for that purpose. The rich, 

 ness of cheese depends on the quantity of cream which the milk may have contained ; its quality of keep- 

 ing on the quantity of salt added ; and the degree of pressure used to exclude the whey. 



6981. Whey expressed from coagulated milk, if boiled, and the whole curd precipitated, becomes trans- 

 parent and colourless. By slow evaporation it deposits crystals of sugar, with some muriate of potash, 

 muriate of soda, and phosphate of lime. The liquid which remains after the separation of the salts is 

 converted by cooling into a gelatinous substance. If whey be kept it becomes sour, by the formation of 

 an acid, which is called the lactic acid ; and it is to this that the spontaneous coagulation of milk, after it 

 remains at rest, is owing. Milk may, after it is sour, be fermented, and it will yield a vinous intoxicating 

 liquor. This is practised by the inhabitants of the most northerly islands of Europe, with buttermilk, and 

 by the Tartars with the milk of the mare. Milk is likewise susceptible of the acetous fermentation. 



6982. The constituent parts of milk are found to be oil, curd, gelatine, sugar of milk, muriate of soda, 

 muriate of potash, phosphate of lime, and sulphur. These substances enter into the milk of all animals, 

 but the proportions vary in different species. The various milks in use as food are thus distinguished : 



6983. Covi's milk produces a copious, thick, and yellow cream, from which a compact consistent butter 

 is formed ; the curd is bulky, and retains much serum, which has a greenish hue, a sweet taste, and con- 

 tains sugar of milk and neutral salts. The milk of the buffalo is essentially the same as that of the cow. 



6984. Ass's milk throws up a cream resembling that of woman's milk ; the butter made from it is white, 

 soft, and disposed to be rancid ; the curd is similar to that of the woman, but not unctuous ; the whey is 

 colourless, and contains less salts, and more sugar, than that of the cow. 



6985. Ewe's milk throws up as muc'i cream as that of the cow, and of nearly the same colour ; the butter 

 made from it is yellow and soft; the curd is fat and viscid; the whey is colourless, and contains the 

 smallest quantity of sugar of any milk, and but a small portion of muriate and phosphate of lime. 



6986. Goat's milk produces abundance of cream, which is thicker and whiter than that from the cow ; 



