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XX. — On the Construction and Ilcatincj of Dairy and Cheese 
Rooms. By Joseph Harding. 
Prize Essay. 
Dairy farming forms an important branch of the agricultural 
economy of our country, and its produce is of scarcely less 
moment in a commercial point of view. Cheese (of which I 
intend more especially to speak) is the staple commodity of some 
of our counties, and, as compared with the produce of other 
countries, occupies the first place ; for though the Parmesan, the 
Roquefort, the Gruyere, the Port de Salut, and several other 
French and continental cheeses, are respectively good of the 
kind, they are not equal to the best English cheese for substantial 
character, and universal adaptation to clime and taste. The fact 
of our method of manufacture being imitated by many foreign 
cheese-makers is in itself an acknowledgement of our superior 
excellence. 
Our improvements of late years in cheese-making have been 
many and important. Dr. Voelcker, in his Essays on ' Milk and 
Cheese,' given in vols. 22, 23, and 24 of the 'Royal Agricultural 
Journal' (which every dairy farmer should read and study), has 
contributed important additions to our stock of scientific know- 
ledge, which, when practically applied, enable us more easily 
to convert our milk into cheese, perfect and pure in flavour. 
But with all our improvements hitherto we have omitted the 
most important. Our scientific knowledge and practical skill 
will fail to succeed in the absence of (1) a proper Dairy, in which 
the milk can be kept sweet ; and (2) a Room to ripen the cheese. 
Throughout our dairy districts most of the farm-houses are 
old, having an old-fashioned dairy-room attached, or immediately 
under its roof, ill-ventilated, often damp and filled with impure 
air, and not unfrequently in close proximity to stables, piggeries, 
&c. It is a mistake to deposit so pure and delicate a material 
as milk in such places. The amount of loss annually sustained 
thereby is almost incredible ; many hundred tons of cheese, 
being in consequence thereof made of an inferior description, are 
sold at \d. to 2c?. per lb. below the price which ought to 
be realised ; whilst in hot and unfavourable seasons, such as 
we occasionally get, many tons fall to pieces and perish. It 
is not however to defective accommodation alone that our 
large quantity of inferior cheese is due ; a rather large share 
belongs to defective skill in the art of making cheese, which can 
no longer be sheltered under the old-fashioned plea " that good 
cheese could never be made from such pastures." Chemical 
researches, and unquestionable practical experience, prove that 
