200 Report on the Cheese Factory System ; 
" Without extra care and cleanliness as to the pails and milk-cans there is 
liability of sour niilk from time to time, which, of course, would not bo 
received at the factory, as milk only slightly acid would damase that with 
which it came in contact. The milk-cans for carrying the milk, it may be 
observed, are somewhat difficult to cleanse and to keep sweet ; and the 
confinement of the milk, and its agitation while being carried in hot weather, 
render it susceptible to change, esjiecially if there be the least taint of acidity 
about the cans. 
" Di.ssatisfactioa often occurs at the factory ■with regard to the condition of 
milk, the superintendent being certain that the milk is slightly and perhaps 
perceptibly changed, while the farmer stoutly insists that it is perfectly sweet ; 
and he goes home in no pleasant mood, complaining that his cans were not 
perfectly cleansed, laying the fault of the sour milk upon some member of his 
family, or disbelieving that tlie milk was changed. If the milk is not received 
at the factory it is a loss to the stockholders. Hence it will be seen that more 
or less trouble is brought about on tliis account. Not unfrequently bad 
feeling is engendered on the part of the farmer and his familj", and he with- 
draws from the association. 
" Another objection is urged, and with some apparent reason, that the quality 
of milk varies with different persons, according to the manner in which the 
cows are supplied with food and are managed throughout the season. It i.-* 
contended that clean, sweet, upland pasture, an abundance of food, and 
l^lentiful supply of pure water, cattle wintereel well and receiving careful 
treatment in every respect, will jiroduce a better quality of milk, from which 
more and better cheese can be made than when the reverse is practised. 
And yet the poor herd that has been wintered improperly, that is pastured 
on the coarse herbage of low lands, with general bad treatment on the part of 
the owner, is credited according to the qtiantity furnished on an equality 
with the better herd. It is not easy to see how this can be remedied without 
excluding such from the association." 
The difficulties which cheese-factories must necessarily contend 
with are thus shown to be somewhat serious ; but that thej can 
be overcome has been proved by practical test in America. 
It now only remains to endeavour to estimate the adaptability 
of the American cheese-factory system to England. The mate- 
rials for this estimate I have collected chiefly by personal visits, 
to dairy districts, and partly also by correspondence with in- 
fluential dairymen. My enquiries have, I venture to think, 
produced a twofold result. In the first place they have afforded 
me material for the following estimate ; and secondly, they have 
performed the much more important function of inducing a 
large number of dairy-farmers to make this estimate for them- 
selves in their own individual cases. When the principal per- 
sons concerned in such a matter, where the question is one of 
superseding a custom sanctioned by the usage of generations, 
begin seriously to consider whether the new system may not be 
better than the one handed down to them by their forefathers, 
they have in most cases gone half way towards forming a correct 
judgment. In Derbyshire a committee of landlords and tenant- 
farmers, nominated by the Derbyshire Agricultural Society, are, 
at this moment, considering the desirability of starting an experi- 
