Report on the Dairy-Farming of the North-west of France. 301 
The system of butter-making is curious. The morning's 
milk, for instance, is skimmed on the evening of the next day, 
that is, after thirty-six hours' standing, and the cream is put 
into the churn, together with the whole milk of another milking. 
The exact arrangement of this process depends upon the 
weather, as in summer butter is made every day, and therefore 
with fresh cream and milk ; but in winter it would not be made 
more than twice a week, and consequently with staler cream, the 
skimmings from more frequent milkings, and with less whole 
milk in proportion. After the churning has proceeded for ten 
minutes or a quarter of an hour, according to the temperature, 
a quantity of pure water is added to the mixture of milk and 
cream in the churn. In summer, this water would be as cold 
as possible, but in winter it would be warmed more or less, 
according to the weather. On some farms, the temperature of 
the mixture is modified by placing into it an earthenware bottle, 
filled with warm or cold water, instead of turning the water 
itself into the churn. The butter comes slowly under this 
system, and takes generally between one and two hours, and in 
hard wintry weather even longer. The butter is not washed in 
the churn ; in fact, on most farms it would be impossible to do 
this, in consequence of the piston-churn being almost uni- 
versally used.* It is, however, well washed and worked in a 
kind of dish afterwards. 
Some people assert that the butter made in this manner rivals 
that of Normandy ; but whether the very choicest makes sold 
fresh, or the ordinary makes sold more or less salted, be taken 
as the standard of comparison, the crucial test of market price is 
largely in favour of Normandy. Nevertheless, the butter has a 
fine delicate taste when fresh ; but to make it keep it requires, 
like all French butters, to undergo another process, which will 
be described presently. 
In this district, as already mentioned, the cows are kept in 
the houses all the year round, except for a few hours in the 
morning and evening in summer. They get artificial grasses 
(chiefly lucerne) cut green at that time of year, and lucerne-hay, 
straw, roots, and bran, in the winter. 
Brittany Butters. — In the different parts of Brittany, butter is 
* Arthur Young mentions a dairy of cows in the Isle of France, " fed entirely 
with lucerne, and the butter excellent ; I admired it much, and found tlie manu- 
facture quite different from the common method. The milk is churned instead 
of the cream. Her (the Viscountess du Font's) dairy-maid is from Bretagne, a 
province famous for good dairymaids. Tlie evening's milk and the moruiug's arc 
put together, and churned as soon as the latter is milked ; the proper quantity of 
salt is added in thochurn, and no washing or making in water, which the^e dairy- 
maids hold to be a very bad method. Finer butter, of a more delicate flavour, was 
never tasted, than procured by this method from lucerne." — Oii. cit.. vol. ii. p. 40. 
