290 On Cheese-making in Home Dairies and in Factories. 
is turned finally off, and the curd, as before, kept stirring a few 
minutes beyond this, until the vat-bottom has cooled down. 
The entire mass is now allowed to rest for an indefinite time, 
during which the manager is careful to watch the development 
of the souring process. An experience of a few months will 
enable any attentive and intelligent person to determine when 
this acidity has attained the proper degree. He may do this by 
taste or smell ; but a surer plan is to take a piece of curd in the 
hand, squeeze the whey well out of it, and touch hot (not red- 
hot) iron with it. If sufficiently acid the curd will stick to the 
hot iron, and draw out in fine threads an inch or more long. 
The whey is now all run off" by a syphon, and the curd is 
gathered to either side of the vat, so that the whey can run down 
the middle. There is yet some little whey left in the curd, and 
this continues to drain slowly away as the curd lies packed at 
the bottom of the vat. Presently the curd, which now adheres 
together in a mass, is cut into pieces, and turned over time after 
time until little or no whey runs from it. It is then ground in 
a curd-mill, and when ground, has salt mixed with it, at the rate 
of 2 lbs. of salt per 1000 lbs. of the milk from which it has been 
made ; in autumn a little more salt is used, or 2^ lbs. of salt 
per 1000 lbs. of milk. The curd being ground to about the 
size of raisins, and salted, is now vatted and put under the 
lever-presses for an hour, during which time the little whey still 
in it is pressed out. It is then taken out of press, bandaged, 
and put in again. Here it remains, with a good pressure upon 
it, until morning, when it is finally taken out of press, conveyed 
to the lower curing-room and weighed, has some tissue-paper 
ironed on to the flat sides of it, and is put on the cheese- 
shelves. Here it is turned daily for a few days until it goes 
to the upper curing-room, where it will be turned every other 
day. This cheese is ready for sale in six weeks to two months 
after it is made. But cheese made in autumn takes a longer 
time to ripen. The tissue-paper is ironed on the cheese with the 
view of preventing cracking. 
" At the present time," says Mr. Sheldon, " there is a dearth 
of factory managers, and the committees of intended cheese- 
factories ought to send young men to our Derbyshire factories 
to be trained, so as to have a manager of their own at hand." 
I add the Bye-Laws of the Holms Dairy, by which the con- 
tributors are bound : — 
*' 1. Persons sending milk to the above dairy shall be required to send, tmc 
each day, the pure milk from the whole of their dairy cows (excepting sucl 
milk as shall be required by them for their family consumption) dnrins; th 
making season, the commencement and termination of which shall be deter 
nrned by the Managing Committee. 
" 2. No person shall send, and the Manager of the Dairy shall have powf 
