398 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ May X4, 1891. 
quirements. To the venison of the park, the fish of the lake 
and streams, the game of the woods, it adds all sorts of poultry 
—chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, guinea fowls and pigeons, with 
■eggs, pork, bacon, hams, lard and fiour ; also hay, corn, straw, 
Carrots, and green fodder for carriage and riding horses, and 
though last, perhaps the most important of all, dairy produce of 
the highest quality. 
There can be no good reason why delicious butter and cheese 
should not always be forthcoming. Butter of a certain quality 
there is always, but a cheese supply would be a new departure, 
and yet it ought not to be so. Take, for example, that king of 
cheeses, the Stilton, what is there in Leicestershire pasture or 
cows that confers any special advantage upon the Midland 
dairies ? Both Stilton and Cheddar cheeses of excellent quality 
are now made at Canadian farms, and a large quantity of 
Canadian Cheddar is sent to England, which goes to show 
how possible it is for really good cheese to be made at any 
farm, and we certainly fail to see why a certain quantity of 
really superior cheese should not be made at the home farm. 
At one time, with the very limited knowledge of the process 
of cheese-making possessed by the ordinary farmer, such a 
proposal would have been rash in the extreme. But now, 
with dairy education constantly improving, the idea is both 
reasonable and practicable. It was owing to ignorance that 
cheese made at farms away from cheese-making districts was so 
frequently a hard indigestible substance, decidedly as unpalatable 
as unwholesome. There is now no excuse for such failures, for 
we have creamometers wherewith to guage the quality of the milk, 
and we know how rich milk requires more rennet than poor milk; 
that the rennet must be quite pure, and the milk be set with it 
at a temperature of 80° immediately after the milking. We know 
how to avoid lactic ferment, how to salt, to press or otherwise, and 
the time and process of ripening. 
Butter making, too, is now not a thing of chance and guess 
work, but an exact science. Every detail of it is done with a 
degree of precision and certainty that quite precludes any possibility 
of failure. No doubt there has been a considerable degree of 
difficulty in changing from the old way of butter making with its 
attendant uncertainty to the new system with its precise method 
and perfect results. In doing this due heed has not always been 
given to the difEerence between old and new dairy utensils. The 
new churns are advisedly made without revolving dashers, the old 
ones have them, and in many a dairy where they are still used the 
risk remains of breaking up the butter grains into a mingled mass 
of butter and buttermilk, which when so mixed cannot be 
separated, and the butter is spoiled. This is precisely what has 
happened thousands of times in bygone days, and the puzzled 
dairymaids have wondered again and again at a failure of which 
they did not know the cause, and were consequently at a loss for 
the remedy. 
It is a fixed rule in the new order of things that churning shall cease 
at once when the butter grains appear, that the grains shall then be 
washed in the churn till not the slightest trace of buttermilk is 
perceptible, and then the butter is ready for the butterworker. 
Now to obtain this result with an old churn having revolving 
dashers, it must be turned slowly at the rate of not more than 
thirty-five times in a minute to avoid breaking the butter grains. 
Careful attention to this enables one to make as good butter with 
an old churn as with a new one, and to avoid that tantalising result 
butter discoloured by streaks of buttermilk. ’ 
We are now taught that in order to have potted butter quite 
good when made, and to ensure keeping it in perfect condition for 
a year, or longer if necessary, it must have the casein or butter¬ 
milk entirely separated from it—just that and nothing more, only 
to pot it and keep it covered by brine, which is changed for fresh 
brine weekly. The old idea was that in order to keep butter in 
crocks or pans it must be well salted ; the new one is that salt in 
the butter is altogether unnecessary. We have only to take all 
due precaution before and during the churning, then to wash well, 
work well, pot carefully, and cover with water or brine, to ensure 
a supply of really excellent, high coloured, and richly fiavoured 
summer butter at Christmas. Who would not have such a house¬ 
hold boon as this ? That full advantage will be taken of this 
important fact at home farms when its full significance is grasped 
we doubt not, and where salting as a matter of taste is preferred 
let it be done with brine or liquid salt, and never with the crude 
salt. One word more, and that is never pot butter made from the 
milk of “ stale ” cows, but rather from the milk of cows in full 
milk—say a month or so after calving. 
WOEK ON THE HOME EAKM. 
The weather has continued most favourable for the corn-hoeing, and 
the land generally was never better in hand than now. Everything has 
contributed to this satisfactory state of things since last harvest. An 
autumn so favourable for tillage that not only was it possible to get 
through most of the ploughing, but also the cleaning of the land, and 
the subsequent ridging with the double-breasted plough of all of it not 
required for winter corn, left it in the best possible condition to derive 
full benefit from the great frost, which began on November 25th, and 
continued till January 22nd, or for fifty-nine days. Never did we see 
even the heaviest soil more delightfully pulverised, and seed beds of 
a fine deep tilth have been the result. The remarkable dryness of 
February enabled us to get the spring corn in exceptionally early, and 
to have the land in readiness for the earlier root crops before the great 
snowstorm of the second week in March. Early sown Barley should 
be plentiful enough this year, and consequently big crops of it may 
be expected from really fertile land. 
But there is a per contra to all this in a long hard winter and a late 
spring. Never were the resources of flock masters and graziers generally 
put to a more severe test. To them the fine weather and drought of last 
autumn proved a positive source of evil, so seriously did it check the 
growth of pasture. Short commons has been the order of things for 
months past on many a farm, and much stock will go upon the pastures 
this month in low condition. All this serves to impart force to our 
teaching, that pasture cultivation is a necessity and an advantage. It is 
precisely poverty stricken pasture that first suffers from drought, and 
that is always most backward in spring growth. Store it with fertility, 
and not only will there be an abundant of early and late feed upon it, 
but summer growth in plenty to spare for silage and hay. Less roots 
and more silage is what we require to enable us to be safe in a long hard 
winter. But we cannot have the silage without cultivation. With it 
our store of winter food should be so abundant as to render us practically 
independent of the weather. To any of our readers who intend 
beginning making silage this season we say. If you would have perfect 
success, let your stacks be large and the pressure thorough and persis¬ 
tent. 
OUR LETTER BOX. 
IVlanures (ZT. W. G.'), —One cwd. mineral superphosphate contains 
30 lbs. soluble phosphate, and the same quantity of bone superphos¬ 
phate contains 40 lbs. soluble phosphate. No doubt the sulphate of 
lime is available as you suggest, but soil deficient in lime should have 
occasional dressings of caustic lime. Muriate of potash, 80 per cent, 
basis, contains 41 9 per cent, of potassium, hence its superiority to 
kainit, 24’9 per cent, basis. 
MBTEOKOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
CAMDEN SQUARE, LONDON. 
Lat. 61° 32' 40" N.; Long. 0° 8' 0" W.; Attitnde, 111 leet. 
DATE. 
9 A.M. 
IN THE DAY. 
PI 
■3 
1891. 
May. 
Barome¬ 
ter at 328 
and Sea 
Level. 
Hygrome¬ 
ter. 
Direction 
of Wind. 
Temp, of 
soil at 
1 foot. 1 
Shade Tem¬ 
perature. 
Radiation 
Temperature. 
Dry. 
Wet. 
Max. 
Min. 
In 
sun. 
On 
^ass 
Inches. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
In. 
Sunday . 
3 
29.947 
48.9 
44.8 
W. 
47.8 
58.7 
35.3 
102.7 
29.2 
Monday. 
4 
29.993 
63.4 
48.9 
W. 
47.9 
61.1 
41.9 
103.9 
35.7 
Tuesday. 
6 
30.182 
61.6 
47.7 
E. 
48.9 
60.9 
47.0 
101.9 
45.2 
Wednesday .. 
6 
30.129 
46.9 
44.9 
N. 
49.4 
67.1 
37.8 
110.1 
31.9 
— 
Thursday .... 
7 
29.970 
58.3 
49.4 
isr. 
50.4 
67.9 
45.4 
110.1 
40.4 
0.020 
Friday . 
8 
29,692 
52„4 
49.7 
s. 
52.2 
61.8 
46.0 
81.1 
38.8 
— 
Saturday .... 
9 
29.758 
52.2 
49.2 
N. 
51.4 
59.2 
44.7 
96.0 
39.4 
0.010 
29.939 
52.0 
47.7 
49.7 
62.4 
42.7 
100.7 
37.8 
0.030 
REMARKS. 
3rd.—Brilliant morning, occasional cloud in afternoon and evening. 
4tli.—Brilliant till 11 A.M., but not much sun after. 
Sth.—Overcast till 10 A M., then bi’ight. 
6th.—Bright from 11 A.M. to 3 P.M., overcast before and after. 
7th.—Bright and warm throughout. 
8th.—Overcast and gloomy, with occasional drizzle in the morning; fine, with occa- 
sionai sun in afternoon. 
9th.—Fair, with occasionai sunshine in morning. 
Fine spring week, temperature just about the average.—Q. J. STMONS. 
