30 
Composition of Cheese. 
strong presumptive evidence in favour of those who maintain 
these views. As a rule, we have found the best cheese on farms 
where the mistress of the house was herself dairvmaid-in-chief, 
especially if industrious habits and scrupulous cleanliness were 
associated with superior intelligence. Indeed 1 have had re- 
cently frequent occasion to notice the intimate connection which 
appears to exist on the one hand between good cheese and clean- 
liness, order, general intelligence, and desire to excel, and on 
the other hand between bad cheese, slovenliness, ignorance, 
and practical conceit. In the best-managed dairies, however, 
cheese-making is practised entirely as an empiric art, which is 
admitted by our best practical authorities to be capable of great 
improvement, the importance of which is obvious when we con- 
sider the large amount of capital directly or indirectly embarked 
in dairy-farming. Mr. Humberstone, member for Chester, has 
the merit of having first directed the attention of our Society to 
the importance of scientific investigation into the principles of 
cheese-making ; and the Council, on the recommendation of the 
Chemical Committee, made a special grant to enable me to visit 
the principal dairy districts of England, to carry out certain 
practical experiments, and obtain what practical assistance I 
required. The more direct laboratory experiments, which, like 
the whole investigation, are still in active progress, have been 
selected by the Chemical Committee as one of the regular 
subjects for investigation for the current year. During the 
last ten months I and two of my assistants have been almost 
exclusively occupied with the analytical work demanded by a 
thorough investigation into the principles of cheese-making. At 
the same time I have spent between four and five weeks at dif- 
ferent times in visiting the dairies of Gloucestershire, Wilts, 
Somersetshire, Warwick, Stafford, and part of Cheshire ; and I 
purpose paying another visit to Cheshire and Derbyshire in the 
ensuing summer vacation. This Paper will embody some of the 
practical conclusions to which I have arrived, partly from my 
v isits, and partly from my investigations. 
The first point to be observed is, that cheese is often spoiled 
(to use an Iidshism) before it is made — that is, before it is 
separated from the milk : in other words, the milk is spoiled. 
Then the cheese is spoiled during the making, and also in the 
keeping. Again I have learned that richer cheese may be made 
on some land, even when a portion of cream has been taken from 
the milk, than on other land where the whole milk is used. 
3rd. I concur with our best and most intelligent cheese-makers 
in the opinion, that good saleable, though perhaps not very fine- 
flavoured, cheese can be made on any description of land, pro- 
vided proper care and attention are paid to the management of 
