Report on the " Working Dairy " at the Derby Show. 633 
sugar kept its place in the estimation of the human race, till this 
and all other industrial nations can boast of the enjoyment of 
such an abundance of the products which now stand in place of 
their more ancient prototype, that (so far as the plenty of it is 
concerned) there would be little exaggeration now-a-days in de- 
scribing our own country in language as glowing as that which 
Moses addressed to his Israelitish followers. " The delight of 
childhood and the solace of old age " has in recent years, indeed, 
become plentiful to a degree undreamed-of in former times. The 
luxury of a century or two ago has now become the necessity of 
every labourer's household; nay, it may be added, of every 
pauper's child. Indeed, perhaps it would be difficult to name 
any single product of modern consumption which will compare 
in cheapness and plentifulness with sugar. An article which, 
notwithstanding the labour necessary for its manufacture, is sold 
in its cheaper forms at a price scarcely exceeding that of fine 
flour, may almost be said to have attained the ne plus ultra of 
abundance. 
But the other delight, which preceded the honey in Mosaic 
promise — where is it? 
In this country of ours, which, more accurately than any 
Canaan, may be described as " a land of hills and valleys, 
which drinketh water of the rain of heaven,"* or " a land of 
brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of 
valleys and hills," t the first luxury of Jewish imagination is, 
alas ! (as far as the majority of its population is concerned) a 
thing conspicuous by its absence. JNIilk, in its primitive form 
the first essential of infant existence, and in its subsequently 
varied types one of the luxuries of epicurean indulgence, 
has somehow been banished from the poor man's table, whilst 
the rich have had to seek abroad those daintier forms of its 
manufactured delicacies which foreign dairies have forestalled 
us in producing. 
To take the commonest product of the dairy : surely it is 
little less than a scandal to English agriculture that good 
wholesome butter of home make should be a rarity instead of 
an article of easy acquisition and everyday consumption. Yet 
it is undoubtedly the case, that in comparatively few house- 
holds of even refined taste can reliance be placed upon this 
primest requisite of the breakfast-table, whilst all sorts of 
piquant condiments are devised to cheat the palate and render 
the rankness of the yellow mixture miscalled " butter " less 
evident. 
As for cheese, the importations from foreign countries are also 
* Dent. xi. 11. 
t Ibid. viii. 7. 
2 u 2 
