STILTON CHEESE 409 



all wanted for food, and, indeed, in its green state is 

 too valuable a fodder to be wasted underfoot. The 

 cows are all Shorthorns, but of no great quality, 

 decidedly inferior in type to those found in the similar 

 limestone country in the West Riding of Yorkshire, 

 Ribblesdale, and Lunesdale. Good blood is evidently 

 wanted in the district, and, as all the farmers are small 

 men unable to buy expensive bulls solely for their own 

 use, there should be an opening for co-operative schemes 

 for the purchase of bulls capable of improving the 

 country stock, especially as we were informed that 

 contagious abortion is practically unknown. Of course, 

 bulls of milking strains would be wanted, because all 

 the farmers make their living out of milk. We only 

 heard of one who depended upon stock-raising, fattening 

 out the steers, and selling the heifers when in milk 

 with their first calves ; he, however, was an educated 

 man with a comparatively large farm, the grass of 

 which he had immensely improved by judicious 

 manuring. 



A large proportion of the milk produced in the 

 uplands of Derbyshire is sold to cheese makers ; at 

 one time cheese was made on most of the farms, but 

 specialization has gradually set in until one man may 

 deal with the milk from 50 or 60 farms besides his 

 own. There is a true Derbyshire cheese, a large flat 

 cheese of the hard curd type with a texture approxi- 

 mating to that of Cheddar or Gruyere, which has the 

 advantage of being ready for sale very quickly after 

 making ; but the really important cheese in this district 

 is the Stilton. Now that the methods of manufacture 

 have been standardized one can almost say that any 

 cheese can be made anywhere ; but South Derbyshire 

 and Leicestershire form the original home of the 

 Stilton, which only acquired that particular name 



