FEEDING FOR BUTTER. 57 



Mr. Cheever. Very little. 



Secretary Russell. Did you have any trouble with it? 



Mr. Cheeyeh. I did not feed enough to form any opin- 

 ion. I have fed but one ton of the " new process " meal in 

 all my experience. 



Question. Has your dairy made as much butter on the 

 same feed this season as in seasons past? 



Mr. Cheever. I do not sec how an answer to that ques- 

 tion would help the point under discussion. My dairy may 

 or may not have been in its usual condition. 



Question. The point I am after is this. There is great 

 complaint in many portions of this section of the State that 

 the same dairy, in substantially the same condition, treated 

 in the same way, does not furnish as much butter from the 

 same amount of milk as formerly. 



Mr. Cheever. I have no experience that would throw 

 light on the subject. We have had a very dry season in the 

 eastern part of the State. It has been, in many respects, 

 a very unfavorable season for our farmers. 



Mr. HiLLMAN of Marlborough. I would like to ask Mr. 

 Bowditch what kind of feed he was giving his steers when 

 he injured them by giving them cotton seed ? 



Mr. BowDiTCTi. Corn-stalks and straw. 



Mr. Taft. I would like to have Mr. Sessions tell us 

 what experience he has had in selling butter in Boston. 



Mr. Sessions. I suppose Mr. Taft is driving at a story 

 he has heard me tell, and wants me to tell it here. I am 

 willing to tell it. Having heard of these high prices for 

 butter, — seventy-five cents, eighty cents and a dollar a 

 pound, — and the making of butter being my business and 

 my wife's business, of course I had some curiosity to know 

 about this matter, and wanted to see if there was not some 

 way in which I could get such prices. So, being in Boston, 

 I went down to the market where I understood some of this 

 kind of butter was sold by commission merchants, and asked 

 to see it. I wanted to compare it with the butter we made, 

 by my own taste. The dealer said he had several different 

 grades of butter, some that he retailed for sixty cents, some 

 for seventy, some for seventy-five, and some for eighty cents 

 a pound, and I don't know but higher. He showed me all 



