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cheese are spoken of by the old Greek writers from the time of 

 Homer, but not butter. Hippocrates, in the fifth centurj before 

 Christ, is the first Grecian Avriter who mentions it, referring its 

 origin to the Scythians. Herodotus, the father of history, in the 

 same century, describes the process of making it among the same 

 people. The Scythians probably owed the discovery to accident. 

 The milk, which in their frequent wanderings they took with them 

 in skins, would by agitation exhibit particles of butter, and this sug-'^ 

 gested the process of churning, a process originally rude and simple. 



Butter was very little known, however, either among the Greeks 

 or Romans, till a comparatively late period. The first recom- 

 mendation of it as an article of food, is by Dioscorides, a little be- 

 fore the time of Christ. He mentions its medicinal or healing 

 virtues, on which Galen, who wrote two hundred years later, is 

 more full. Galen affirms that he had seen it made of cow's milk, 

 though Dioscorides makes mention only of sheep and goat's milk. 

 Pliny ascribes its invention to the " barbarous nations," that is, 

 as he generally uses the term, the ancient Germans and Britons ; 

 and says, that it Avas made from the milk of the sheep, the goat, 

 and the cow. 



Still it was little, if at all, used as an article of food, the recom- 

 mendation of Dioscorides notwithstanding. It was used in medi- 

 cine, and as an ointment in baths, and sometimes, as among the 

 Egyptian Christians, was burned in lamps instead of oil. In the 

 ancient Roman Cathohc churches its use in lamps was sometimes 

 permitted, when oil failed. The ancient butter, however, appears to 

 have been a very inferior article ; it was not solid, or concrete, like 

 ours, but liquid, and is always referred to as poured out, and not cut. 



Butter is mostly used in the more northerly countries of Europe. 

 In the southern, where olive-groves abound, its use is, in a great 

 measure, superseded by that of oil. 



The making of good butter is an art. Its good or bad quality 

 is sometimes attributed to food or pasturage ; and this has an 

 effect, no doubt. Certain it is, that particular plants fed upon by 

 cattle, impart a flavor, sometimes disagreeable, to butter. But 

 more, we believe it is now admitted, depends on the making. 

 Speaking of Great Britain, a writer, whose opinion is entitled to 

 great respect, says : " In every district where fine butter is made, 

 it is universally attributed to the richness of the pastures, though 



