GERMANY. 457 



Aichstetten numbered, on the 1st of December, 1880, 826 inhabitants. 

 Its area comprises 1,441 hectares, of which 800 are arable land, 260 

 meadow, 21 pasture, and 360 wQod. 



The live stock amounted, according to the census of 1873, to 117 

 horses, 1,019 head cattle, and 120 swine. Sheep are not kept. 



The classification of property of those citizens, numbering about 100, 

 who chiefly occupy themselves with agriculture, is at present as follows : 

 Farmers who own above 20 hectares are counted among the large pro- 

 prietors; farmers with 10 to 20 hectares among the middling, and those 

 under 10 hectares among the small ones. According to this division 

 there are at present at Aichstetten twenty large, forty middling, and 

 forty small proprietors. There are no large estates, properly so called ; 

 according to the rating generally prevailing, and especially in North 

 Germany, concerning landed estates, the large proprietors would count 

 among the middling, so that, according to this scale, only middling and 

 small farmers are to be found at Aichstetten. 



THE ASSOCIATION DAIRY AT ALLGAXT. 



Dairies have been established in the Allganfor a long time past, and 

 there is considerable cheese manufactured, not ordinarily, however, by 

 the farmers themselves, but by " cheesers" (Kaser), to whom the farmers 

 furnish the milk at a fixed price (for some years past at 8 to 9 pfennigs 

 per liter), whilst the waste of buttermilk and whey is returned to the 

 furnishers of the milk. Under these conditions, the sale of the milk 

 has become more and more a matter of monopoly for the "Kaser;" 

 they fix the price of the milk, and the farmers have been able to do 

 nothing against this one-sided arrangement, as the individual farms are 

 mostly too small to enable their owners to manufacture their own cheese 

 profitably, and, moreover, as, owing to the lack of larger towns in the 

 vicinity, a direct sale of the milk is impossible. Besides, dairy manage- 

 ment had not kept pace with recent improvements, and the preparation 

 of butter had in many cases continued defective. A thorough improve- 

 ment of these conditions could only be looked for by the formation of 

 associations among the farmers, who would jointly and practically look 

 after the making of butter and cheese. At the same time it was to be 

 expected that the introduction of the principle of association into agri- 

 culture would exercise a favorable effect also on its other branches. 



In order to attain the desired aim, it was first of all necessary ta 

 bring the new method of dairy management to the notice of the farm- 

 ers in the Wurtembergish Allgau. An agricultural exhibition held at 

 Leutkirch in the autumn of 1879, by the twelfth agricultural district 

 association, offered the wished-for occasion. With it was connected a 

 dairy exhibit, in which, at the expense of the royal centralstelle for agri- 

 culture, the making of butter and cheese after the latest methods (to- 

 gether with the separator arrangement) was for a few days practically 

 illustrated. This special exhibit aroused the highest interest among 

 the great number of country people who attended. On the 28th of Sep- 

 tember, eight resident farmers, owning 152 cows in all,resolved upon the 

 founding of an association for the common handling and sale of the 

 milk, and charged a committee with the preliminaries for the establish- 

 ment of a dairy building of their own. But various obstacles caused 

 delay, and it was not until the 29th of January, 1880, that the associa- 

 tion was definitely organized as "The Wiirtembergische Molkerei 

 Aichstetten, eingetragene Genossenschaft " (registered association). 



