72 THE DAIRY OF THE FARM. 



and disagreeable taste by beating or mixing it in fresh 

 water with chloride of lime. The operation consists in 

 beating the butter in a sufficient quantity of water, in 

 which put " 25 or 30 drops of chloride of lime " to 2 Ibs. 

 of butter. After having mixed it till all its parts are in 

 contact with the water, it may be left in it for an hour or 

 two, and afterwards withdrawn, and washed anew in fresh 

 water. Another correspondent recommends that the butter 

 should be kneaded with fresh milk, and then with pure 

 water. He states that, by this treatment, the butter is 

 rendered fresh and pure in flavour as when recently 

 made. He ascribes this result to the fact that butyric 

 acid, to which the rancid odour and taste are owing, is 

 readily soluble in fresh milk, and is thus removed. 



Churning (1.) In those cases where whole milk 

 is churned for butter, the churn is a fixture. It is 

 an upright somewhat conical vessel, made so, however, 

 only in order to secure the tightness of its hooping, 

 and it is of various dimensions, from three feet and 

 upwards in height, and from fifteen inches in dia- 

 meter, according to the quantity of milk to be treated. 

 This milk is churned when about three days old, 

 varying according to the weather, being first -allowed 

 to cool and then placed in large wooden vats to become 

 sour. The practice is to place it in coolers, as in ordinary 

 dairies, until it has acquired the temperature of the air, 

 thereafter to pour it into large wooden vats capable of 

 holding two meals at a time, where it sours ; and if churn- 

 ing is done twice or three times a week, to put into the 

 churn all the milk which has become sour, whether it 

 be sixty, forty-eight, or only twenty-four hours old ; 



