ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN’S ASSOCIATION. 41 
able in amount. Compare the product of milk strained 
into six-quart crocks or pans, set on the bottom of a cellar, 
churned by hand in five to fifteen pound batches, either by 
the housewife, milkmaid, or the proprietor himself, worked 
with a paddle or ladle, put into rolls of one to five pounds 
and neatly marked, rolled up in a napkin or piece of old 
cotton gai ment, and taken to market along with a few eggs 
and vegetables, perhaps—compare, I say, this product, both 
as to quality and cost in labor, with the product of an asso¬ 
ciated dairy enterprise, and you have the extremes of the 
economic view I would like to bring before you, so far as 
quality and cost are concerned. Now consider the relative 
rewards probably received, and the contrast is complete. 
Now every small dairy approaches more or less near the 
unfavorable extreme I have described, as to the cost of the 
product in labor. The quality of the product may be, and 
sometimes is, equal to and even superior to the product of 
the large dairy or the associated dairy; but this is not 
usually so, and is liable to be so only at the cost of greater 
expenditure in valuable labor. Circumstances may and 
sometimes do warrant this; but this is the exception and 
not the rule. 
I have no doubt, therefore, that dairying as a specialty 
is far the most profitable form in which this business can 
be engaged in. Of course, it is better to market the butter 
produced on any farm, over and above home wants, rather 
than waste it; but not much profit for labor is likely to 
come from this source. 
1 he above conclusion, however, does not imply cer¬ 
tain things, and it does imply certain other things. It 
does not imply that any kind of a farmer, on any kind 
of a farm, with any kind of cows, with any kind of 
management, can, by making dairying a specialty, “pay 
off the mortgage ” and achieve success. It does not 
imply that the man, who thinks he knows it all to begin 
with and who does not master his business, will make 
dairying profitable. It does not imply that the farmer, with 
land especially adapted to grain raising and not to grass, 
with water scanty or poor, will succeed. 
It does imply that the dairyman shall have a liking for 
his business and shall master it in its details. He shall not 
be afraid to roll up his sleeves and go to work himself. He 
shall take the dairy papers, attend the dairy conventions, 
