CHEESE. 83 



cylindrical vat, and the upper a tinned cylinder slipping 

 into it as the curd on pressure sinks. After a certain 

 pressure in this form, the curd is removed and cut 

 and broken by hand or by a curd mill, and from 1 to 2 Ibs. 

 of fine salt is scattered over it, according to the weight of 

 the cheese ; about 1 Ib. to every 40 Ibs. of cheese is a 

 common quantity. The whole curd being then rebroken, 

 is refilled into the vat, into which a cheese cloth has 

 previously been placed. It is then put gradually under 

 pressure, which after the second or third day amounts to 

 many hundredweights upon each cheese. 



Every day the cheese is turned and wrapped in fresh 

 cloths ; and on the seventh or eighth day of this treatment, 

 or as soon as dry, it is removed to the loft and there 

 swathed around with strong girthing, and placed on a 

 bench. By and by it is laid, still swathed as before, on a 

 layer of straw on the floor of the room, and there it lies till 

 from ten weeks to four months old, when it is ready for 

 sale. 



In some dairies, in order to the perfect extraction of the 

 whey, skewers are used on the first day to pierce it, being 

 thrust repeatedly into it through the holes in the cheese 

 vat, in order to the formation of drains for the liquid. The 

 whey is heated in a boiler ; some drainings from the cheese 

 of the previous day, commonly called " thrustings," are 

 added to it ; and after a first skimming some sour butter- 

 milk is thrown into the boiler, and then the heat raised to 

 180 Fahr., when it iss kimmed again. By the first skim- 

 ming a cream called " fleetings " is obtained, yielding a 

 very good butter; and by the second, a substance used 

 principally for feeding calves ; the whey is afterwards given 

 to the pigs. Excepting a portion of the cream used in the 



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