774 
nent; but the best is grown in the Cingalese 
province of Jaffna and in the island of Manar. 
A separate caste of the Cingalese population are 
distinguished as diggers of this root. 
CHEBULA,—botanically Terminalia Chebula. 
An ornamental, medicinal, economical, ever- 
green, tropical tree, of the combretum tribe. It 
was introduced to Britain from India in 1796; 
and it carries whitish-green flowers, and usually 
grows to the height of about 20 feet. It abounds 
in Mysore, and in some other parts of India; and 
is held in much esteem for a considerable variety 
of uses. Its leaves, when the plant is very young, 
are employed in some culinary preparations. 
The whole plant is exceedingly astringent, and 
contributes its various parts for purposes which 
require powerful astringent action. It was as- 
certained by some experiments of Dr. Roxburgh 
to be more astringent than even Aleppo galls; 
and when combined in equal proportions with 
these galls, and with an Indian preparation of 
the betel-nut, it is considered by the Vytians an 
excellent external application in aphthous affec- 
tions of either children or adults. The pulver- 
ized flower of the plant is also administered in- 
ternally as a gentle astringent in bowel com- 
plaints. The Chebula is employed in tanning 
_ and dressing leather, in producing a yellow dye, 
_ and in acting asa mordant to fix many of the 
_ colours in Hindoo dye-stuffs. 
CHEESE. A well known condimental food, 
_ formed principally of the pressed and dried 
caseum or curd of milk. Cheese and curdled milk 
appear to have been known and used so long 
ago as the patriarchal ages of the Hebrew com- 
monwealth. Job says, “Hast thou poured me 
out as milk, and curdled me like cheese?” Ho- 
mer speaks of cheese as part of the ample stores 
which Ulysses and his companions found in the 
cave of the Cyclops Polyphemus, 
“The bending shelves with loads of cheeses prest, 
The folded flocks, each separate from the rest.” 
David was sent by his father Jesse, to “carry ten 
cheeses to the captain of their thousand in the 
camp, and to see how his brethren fared.” Cheese 
of kine formed part of the supplies of David’s 
army at Mahanaim, during the rebellion of Ab- 
salom. Cheese is mentioned by Euripides, Theo- 
critus, and other early poets. Ludolphus says 
that excellent cheese and butter were made by 
the ancient Ethiopians; and Strabo says, “Some 
of the ancient Britons were so ignorant, that, 
though they had abundance of milk, they did 
not understand the art of making cheese.” The 
art of cheese-making was well known to the Ro- 
mans, and seems to have been introduced by 
them into both divisions of Great Britain. But 
all their cheeses appear to have been made with- 
out the use of rennet, or simply by allowing the 
milk slowly to sour, and afterwards pouring off 
| its whey. The art of curdling milk with rennet 
_ seems not to date higher in Britain than about 
the middle of the eighth century; and the prac- 
CHEESE. 
tice of making cheeses of full milk, or otherwise 
than with skimmed milk, was unknown in Scot- 
land till about the middle of last century. 
Cheeses are exceedingly various in consistency, 
flavour, and other properties, according to the 
peculiar qualities of the milk, but particularly 
to the special methods of manufacture. Hard 
and dried cheeses are adapted and often designed 
to be long kept; the drier and poorer they are, 
the longer can they be preserved ; 
are by far the most bulky and abundant class 
of cheeses, and comprise an exceedingly wide 
range of variety, from the most insipid and lea- 
thery skimmed-milk cheese, to the richest and 
most piquant Cheshire or double Gloucester. | 
Soft and juicy cheeses, such as all cream cheeses, 
and the luxurious kinds called Bath cheeses and 
Yorkshire cheeses, cannot be long kept without 
becoming putrid, and are designed to be sold and 
used as speedily as possible after they are made. 
Some varieties, such as the Stilton and the Gruy- | 
eres, are intermediate in consistency between the 
hard and the soft, and possess a medium degree | 
of capacity of preservation. The method of 
manufacture, especially when regarded as includ- 
ing the control of temperature, and the addition | 
of foreign ingredients, is the grand power in 
creating and determining varieties,—insomuch | 
that not only may scores of very perceptibly dif- 
ferent varieties be intentionally manufactured in | 
one dairy and one season, from one kind of milk, 
but very frequently eight or a dozen quite per-— 
ceptibly different varieties are unintentionally | 
produced from one process, and among one sea- | 
“ After all | 
that can be done,” remarks Mr. Aiton, “cheeses | 
which are made in the same way from the milk of | 
the same cows, and every operation performed — 
alike, will differ considerably in quality and fla- | 
This diversity is greater in the Scotch > 
than in the English cheese, owing probably to | 
the former being made in ill-constructed houses, _ 
and with imperfect apparatus, while in England | 
the dairies are large, the dairy-houses of superior | 
son’s set of homogeneous cheeses. 
vour. 
formation, and the operations more uniformly 
amaatneias! Milk is more easily contaminated 
with the slightest impurities than any other 
substance in common use. It is fortunate that, 
while there are diversities in the qualities and 
flavour of cheese, there are also diversities in the 
taste of its consumers.” But before mentioning 
the characteristics of the chief varieties gener- 
ally known in the British market, or in the dif- 
ferent sections of the British dairy, we must 
make a brief sketch of the general method of 
manufacture. 
Milk, when exposed for two days or so to the 
open air, acidifies, and soon after coagulates; 
and its coagulum, when artificially broken, sepa- 
rates from the larger portion of the serum or 
whey, and may afterwards, by means of salting 
and prolonged pressure, be formed into exactly 
such cheese as seems to have been used by the 
and they | 
