XXI] INTRODUCTION. 



The total amount of the imports of dairy produce into 

 with the sources from which they come, is fully shown in th^ 

 table on p. 21. 



It will be seen from the foregoing table that while the imports 

 of dairy produce into Britain from the United States are still lar^e, 

 and while those from Canada and Australia are rapidly increasing, 

 there are also large, and, in some cases, still increasing, supplies 

 sent in from the several European countries which, for many years 

 before the development of the trans-oceanic trade, formed our chief 

 source of foreign supply. 



So far as cheese and cured butter are concerned, the home manu- 

 facturer of these products has little advantage in the markets over 

 the foreign producer, except what is afforded by any injury that 

 may be done to the quality and flavour in the course of transit, 

 and the costs involved in the transport of the foreign product. This, 

 however, owing to the low rates of shipping freights that have ruled 

 for a number of years, confers only a limited protection, and it in 

 now generally admitted that the only hope the British dairyman has 

 to compete successfully with the large foreign competition is by the 

 manufacture of produce of distinctly superior quality. This can 

 only be effected by giving the butter and cheese makers of this 

 country such a training as will enable them to attain to the highest 

 perfection in the practice of their delicate and difficult art. Unfor- 

 tunately, up till quite recent years technical instruction in dairying 

 received almost no attention in Britain. An empirical art, differing 

 in various details of practice not only in every parish and county 

 but even on adjacent farms, was handed down from father to son, 

 or communicated from neighbour to neighbour in an unsystematic 

 and incomplete form that wholly prevented any general improve- 

 ment in the art of dairy manufacture. Consequently the manufac- 

 tured products were very variable, and often of an inferior character 

 and value. 



While the art of dairying was thus imperfectly communicated, 

 the science of dairying, as it is now known, had till very recently 

 no existence. Thirty years ago there was practically no EnglisK 

 dairy literature. Appliances for the manufacture of butter and 

 cheese were few, and were imperfect. The principles that regulated 

 their manufacture were not understood, and the practice was accord^ 

 ingly irregular and unsatisfactory. There were no dairy schools, 

 and no recognized means of obtaining intelligent instruction in 



