618 Transactions of the American Institute. 



forty-five minutes ; average, six and one-lialf minutes, and in from 

 one and one-lialf to two minutes the butter was fully gathered, and 

 each time was good solid butter. I noticed the temperature of cream 

 only at the sixth and seventli churnings. At the sixth, the tempe- 

 rature of cream, fifty-six degrees (a little too low) ; of milk house, 

 thirty-eight degrees, and room where cream was kept, from sixty 

 degrees to sixty-four degrees. At the seventh trial the cream was at 

 fifty-nine degrees. The kind of churn used was the old-fashioned 

 barrel churn. Don't need any patent ones. 



Report on Carragean, a j^ew Article of Food. 



Tlie committee of ladies, Mrs. Conner, Mrs. Bruen, Mrs. Gushing, 

 Mrs. Lyman and Mrs. Chambers, requested to report on the nature 

 and value of Carragean or Irish moss, as a dish for the table, find 

 that tlie substance grows on rocks and stones on the seacoasts of 

 Euro]-)e, and in peculiar abundance on the Atlantic coast of Ireland, 

 where it is chiefly gathered. It is said to be a native of the United 

 States, and is found in limited quantities on the coast of Massachu- 

 setts. It is picked from the rocks at low tide. After being washed 

 it is dried in the sun. Chemists and doctors who have analyzed it, 

 find it is nutritive and demulcent, and being easy of digestion, it 

 forms a useful article of diet as a substitute for grain foods, and is 

 particularly recommended in chronic pectoral affections, scrofulous 

 complaints, dysentery, diarrhea. Carragean is very gelatinous and 

 very valuable as food. It is recognized as superior to all orders of 

 moss as demulcent, and in its nutritive qualities. It is said that 

 Napoleon Bonaparte said to Dr. O'Meara, that it was employed by 

 physicians in Corsica, in the treatment of tumors and cancers, on 

 account of the iodine it contains. It is used in England and France 

 as a light and nourishing article of diet. 



The moss as it comes from the sea, is filled with sand, pebbles, 

 small shells, &c., and very saline in taste, and prepared as food in its 

 original state, is very troublesome to the housekeeper, while it is 

 very easy to prepare when made from our sea moss farina. By our 

 process it is first thoroughly washed and deprived of its extreme 

 saline taste. It is then picked over by hand, and dessicatcd, after 

 which it passes through several mills and machines, by which it is 

 cleaned perfectly, and reduced to a powdered and concentrated con- 

 dition without being deprived of its refreshing ocean flavor. A 

 packet of corn starch, maizena or farina, costs sixteen cents at retail, 



