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THE ILLINOIS FAEMEK. 



July 



h** Advantages and Disadvantages of 

 Cheese Factories. 



One of the most intelligent and experienced 

 dairymen in the State of New York, Mr. X. A. 

 Wiliaid, of Little Falls, briefly enumerates the 

 advantages of cheese factories thus: "The advan 

 tages claimed for the factory system are superior 

 quality, uniformity, higher prices, saving by buying 

 at wholesale such materials as salt, bandage, an- 

 natto, boxes, etc., and finally, relieving the farmer 

 and his family from the diudgery of the manufac- 

 ture and care of cheese." That tUese claims are 

 just there can be little doubt, and they certainly 

 go very far to commend the establishment in ques- 

 tion to public attention and favor. It is easy to 

 see that a factory superentendent, thoroughly 

 understanding his business, giving his entire time 

 and attention to it, and having every fieility for 

 doing things in the most approved manner, is likely 

 to produce an article of cheese far superior in 

 quality to that made, under many difficulties, it 

 may be in the farmer's family. No doubt, with 

 special care, as fine an article of cheese can be 

 made by the individual farmer as by the factor 

 but it is an unequal contest, in which the obvious 

 advantages of the factory must have their influence. 

 Cheese manufictured in small parcels varies much 

 in quality, and to command a good price, it is nec- 

 essary to have the quality as uniform .is possible. 

 The factories have already established for them- 

 selves a reputation in these respects which secures 

 for their products the highest price in tiie market. 

 The produce of single dairies is always bought by 

 large dealers with an allowance for unequal or im 

 perfect cheese. But it is affirmed by competent 

 judges that an aggregate of one hundred thousand 

 pounds of factory cheese is frequently so uniformly 

 excellent in quality, that the most practiced eye 

 can scarcely detect any difference in the manufac- 

 ture. It is said that factory cheese sells at a price 

 above that of single dairies equal to the whole cost 

 of manufacturing. In November, 1862, good cheese 

 of family manufacture sold from ten to twelve and 

 a-half cents per pound, while Oneida f ictory cheese 

 brought fourteen cents, and the larger sizes, weigh- 

 ing from VOO to 1,000 pounds each, brought in 

 some cases as high as seventeen cents per pound. 

 A better price, too, can be afforded by the whole- 

 sale dealer for the factory made article, because 

 less time, trouble and expense are consumed in 

 the purchase. It is as easy to buy the produce of 

 six hundred or a thousand cows as that of a " twenty 

 cow" dairy, so far as time and trouble are con- 

 cerned. Passing over the saving effected in the 

 materials used in cheese-making, it appears to us 

 that the relief afforded by the factory plan to the 

 farmers wives and daughters is an important con- 

 sideration. This argument is even more weighty 

 in Canada than in the United States, where the 

 men assist in dairy operations more largely than is 

 the case in this country. Here the entire burden 

 rests on the female members of the family, and 

 many an overtaxed wife and mother finds the care 

 of her dairy a very serious addition to her toilsome 

 household duties. That eminently practical medi- 

 cal writer. Dr. Hall, in an article on the health ot 

 farmers' families, expresses the opinion that "many 

 a farmer's wife is literally worked to death, in an 

 inadvertent manner, from want of reflection and 

 consideration on the part of her husband ;" and Mr. 



Willard, whom we quoted at the outset of this 

 article, says : "It is believed, and we speak advised- 

 ly, that the old method of cheese-making has done 

 more to injure the health of women in cheese-dairy- 

 ing districts than any other cause." He styles 

 this the most important advantage to farmers in 

 this union arrangement, and adds: "It would be 

 difficult to estimate this in dollars and cents," since 

 the value of life and health is not to be thus com- 

 puted. 



The drawbacks connected with cheese factories 

 are chiefly these: the difficulty of detecting adult- 

 erated milk ; the trouble of carrying it to the fac- 

 tory ; the danger in hot weather of its becoming 

 sour; the difference in tlie quality of milk, arising 

 from the m inner in which cows are fed and man- 

 aged ; and, finally, the loss of the whey. It is 

 evident that a dishonest person furnishing a large 

 quantity of milk could easily add a portion of water, 

 and thus increase the amount paid or credited to 

 him. — No effectual mode of readily detecting such 

 admixture has yet been discovered. Some cases 

 of this sort have been found out, and the dishonest 

 persons have been summarily expelled from the 

 association, and have justly become objects of con- 

 tempt among their neighbors. — We see not why 

 such dihonesty is not punishable by law. If not, 

 it ought to be. The daily delivery of milk at the 

 factory, at a regular hour, is doubtless attended 

 with trouble; but the question is whether that 

 trouble be not well repaid. As to the liability of 

 the milk to sour, extra care and cleanliness in all 

 the vessels used in milking, straining, and carrying 

 to the lactory will effectually prevent this. The 

 loss of the whey is regarded by some as an impor- 

 tant item, but the thorough manner in which the 

 work is done at the factory, is said to lessen very 

 much the value of the whey, while of course, it in- 

 creases the yield and profits of the cheese. — On 

 the whole, therefore, the advantages of this sjstem 

 would seem greatly to outweigh the disadvantages, 

 and we cannot but wish to see the cheese factory 

 become a popular and prevalent institution in 

 Canada. — Canadt Farmer. 



How Tastes Differ. 



Reamir relates, on the authority of M. de la Hire, 

 that young French lady could never resist the 

 temptation of eating a spider whenever she met 

 with one in Ikt walks. They are said to taste like 

 nuts, at least this was the opinion of the celebrated 

 Maria Schurman, who not only eat them, but jus- 

 tified her taste by saying that she wa.s born under 

 Scorpia. Latrille informs us that the astronomer, 

 Laianue, was equally fond of this offensive morsel. 

 Man is truly an omnivorous animal; for there ia 

 nothing which is disgusting to one nation that is 

 not the choice food of another. Flesh, fish, fowl, 

 insects, even the gigantic centipedes of Brazil, 

 many of them a foot and a half in length, and half 

 an inch broad, were seen by Humboldt to be 

 dragged out of their holes and crunched alive by 

 the children. 



Serpents of all sorts have been consumed as 

 food, and the host of the celebrated inn at Ter- 

 racini frequently accosts his guests as politely 

 "requesting to know if they prefer the eel of the 

 hedge or the eel of the ditch." To evince this 

 attachment to their favorite pursuit, most natural- 



