134 Report on the Trial of Dairy Implements 
as an expensive luxury. Various methods are now adopted for 
preserving milk. In a condensed form it retains all its original 
properties unimpaired for a long period, and is said to be capable 
of withstanding every vicissitude of climate. When condensed, 
it is stored in hermetically sealed tins, and by adding about 
four times its bulk of water, it forms a good substitute for new 
milk when that is not procurable. 
So far I have looked at the subject entirely from a consumer's 
point of view ; now I turn to the interests of the producer. 
It is generally admitted that more progress has been made 
during the last ten years than during the previous three-quarters 
of a century. Virtually the same systems of treating dairy- 
cattle had been in operation for ages, and had been handed 
dewn from sire to son, and mother to daughter, unimpaired and 
unimproved. The cows were turned out into the pasture-fields, 
during the daytime, even in the severest weather, to crouch 
and shiver under the temporary shelter of some hedge or tree ; 
whilst in the sheds their chief food throughout the long and 
dreary months of winter was hay, frequently of poor quality, 
and invariably in an unprepared state, with the exception of an 
occasional load of brewers' grains. No artificial food of any kind 
was ever used ; the young stock were confined to the same 
meagre fare, hence they were stunted in their growth, and late in 
arriving at maturity, the heifers never coming to the pail until 
three years old and upwards. Very little attention was bestowed 
on the selection of bulls of a superior type or quality, their 
chief merit was the capability of reproduction. Happily those 
ancient notions have been dispelled, and the dairy farmer has 
now become fully alive to his own interests. There are few 
farmers who milk 20 cows and upwards who do not use a bull 
with two or three pure crosses of blood ; the young stock are better 
reared and better kept, and bring their first calf at twenty-four 
to twenty-eight months old. This not only saves eight months' or 
a year's keep, but it is generally admitted that two-year-olds milk 
better than three-year-old heifers, if they are well kept. The 
factory system and the milk trade have taught the dairy farmer 
a valuable lesson, by bringing more forcibly under his notice 
the exact yield of milk which his cows daily produce ; hence 
the utility of selection is forced upon the farmers, and all 
inferior milkers are drafted out. Some persons, with only a 
superficial knowledge of the subject, raise an objection to milk- 
selling, on the ground that it injuriously affects the interests 
of the landlords by exhausting the manurial condition of the 
land. On the contrary, my experience of milk-selling for 
the last five years on large estates, both in Derbyshire and in 
Cheshire, has fully convinced me of the beneficial results which 
