Experiences of the Severe Winter 0/ 1890-91. 295 
ducer except we adopt his methods. We hav'e the best raw 
material in the world, and yet we are urged to persistently 
follow an unprofitable system ending in loss and disgust. 
Were the English dairy farmers to co-operate and produce 
butter in quantity, they are in a position to command the 
best market prices of the day. The demand for the highest 
quality of fresh butter is limited ; only the best hotels and 
private families will pay the price. For first-class powdered 
or slightly salted butter, the demand is practically unlimited ; 
if farmers would combine together and, instead of cultivating 
a fresh butter trade, would lightly salt and tub the butter on 
the Normandy principle, and dispatch it to market daily, it 
would at once take the place of the Danish and Normandy 
produce, and when well made it would excel either of these 
in quality. The Normandy butter is the produce of small 
holdings ; the butter is churned at home, and is sent to a 
factoiy where it is graded and packed for market. Butter made 
in this way is never equal to that made from new milk, mixed 
and passed through the separator, churned and packed on the 
spot. 
I am well acquainted with three leading Dairy Counties, 
and in my wanderings visit the butter markets whenever an 
opportunity offers. During the last three weeks of April, 
farmers" butter was selling at from lOt?. to 1^;. per pound, 
and in many country markets a pound means eighteen ounces. 
Many of the sellers sit in the market for hours, waiting 
for the customer who never comes ; the old hands have a few 
regular customers, who pay their shilling and go. Even 
at the lower price it is not unusual for a considerable qwantity 
to remain unsold at the end of the day. AVhat a contrast with 
the cheese and butter shop round the corner ! Here they are 
busy all day supplying the country people with Norman and 
Danish butter at '2d. to 1--'. o(/. per pound of 16 ounces. The 
Co-operative Stores in a large town well known to me take SOU 
to 1,200 lb. per week from a factory five miles distant, instead of 
supplying their wants from the butter market not more than a 
hundred yards from their own door, and at a price for the factory 
butter from od. to Id. per lb. above the current price in the 
market. 
It is said butter making does not pay, nor is it likely to do so 
whilst made in the farmhouse. We want the light of science 
to illuminate the dark path of farmhouse dairy management. 
According to the recent utterances of some of our advanced 
teachers, they are still guided as to the development of the 
acidity of cream by taste and smell, whilst the acidity of the 
