212 
STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY, 
in the two cases and see. Bat first, let me remark, that the 
active agent in rennet is now known to reside in minute 
globular bodies called cells, which float in the gastric juice by 
myriads : that they are the cause of coagulation and digestion 
when applied to warm milk, whether in the stomach or out of 
it; and that they are, like the globules of cream which they 
somewhat resemble, mechanically inclosed in the coagulum 
they have formed, and remain there to continue the process of 
digestion they have begun. 
Let us now suppose a gallon of milk to be taken into the 
stbmach of a calf, and a quantity also placed in your cheese 
tub; gastric juice, containing an abundance of digestive cells, 
is applied to each, the one naturally, the other artificially; but 
with this difference, the quantity which the calf applies to one 
gallon of milk we apply to 300 or 400 gallons, and conse¬ 
quently one coagulates in ten minutes and the other in an hour. 
In one case the' curd is broken up and kept stirred by the per¬ 
istaltic motions of the stomach, in the other, with the curd knife 
•and the hand of the dairymaid. The whey separates in each 
alike, but in one case it is absorbed av^^ay and carried into the 
circulation, and in the other it is carried away artificially. The 
curds in each case, at first soft, gradually harden till the whey 
is nearly all separated and they become firm and solid, one rap¬ 
idly, the other slowly. We may now suppose that the curd in 
the stomach has assumed its most compact form, and the arti¬ 
ficial curd a corresponding condition ; that it has been through 
the press and now lies on the shelf in the curing room. The 
curd in the stomach full of digestive cells, with new ones in 
% 
multiplied thousands poured out upon it with the increased sup¬ 
ply of gastric juice, is kept at 98 ^. The curd in the curing 
room, containing only the cells employed to coagulate it, is 
kept at 70 , or below. In the former the digestive process is 
rapidly hurried on, and in a few hours the hard and tenacious 
structure of the curd begins to be broken down and appear 
soft and salvy, and to assume a cheesy texture, as well as 
cheesy flavor and odor. In the latter, the process is slow. In 
a few weeks, instead of a few hours, its firm and tenacious 
structure begins to yield to the digestive agency, and also be- 
