38 CHEESE AND CHEESE-MAKING 



and other materials common in the household. 

 It is probable that it is abundant in every apart- 

 ment of a house, and nowhere more so than in 

 the dairy where cheese is made. If we regard 

 the mould as a plant, and that plant as a weed, 

 we shall better understand the principle which 

 is followed in its extensive production by 

 remembering that as the seeds of weeds are 

 more prolific in the production of plant life 

 when they fall upon fertile soil (such as the 

 well-tilled and well-manured arable land of the 

 farm) than when they fall upon the highway, 

 so does the tiny plant which we call mould 

 increase with great rapidity when it alights, as 

 it were, from the atmosphere upon curd, which 

 to it is a most fertile soil. It grows, elaborates 

 its seeds or spores, which in their turn are shed 

 abroad, falling upon similarly fertile soil, the 

 curd of other cheeses, ultimately covering the 

 portions in which they are permitted to grow. 



GORGONZOLA. Gorgonzola cheese is made 

 from average cows' milk of the northern part 

 of Italy, in which country I had the advan- 

 tage of learning a great deal about the system. 

 The cows' milk of Lombardy, to which refer- 



