Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1868-10-30

1862. 2.,............1shl 1868, 6,"..."s.s''''.' 'aeh
Observation-Disclosures isGs jabouj ..,.....Ss
The present price Of good butter at re-
tail ranging from fifty 10 sixty cents per
pound in Cincinnati, operates as serious
curtailment Of its use in multitudes OF
families in moderate circumstances. Are
we to have butter famineP The New
York reports indicate q similar advance
in price, and decrease in the exports to
foreign countries of some millions OF
pounds per annum. From the Western
Reserve we learn that the milk which
used TO 90 70 make butter for export Is OF
late years turned almost wholly to the
manufacture Of cheese, and that in pro-
digious quantities. Huge cheese factories,
operated by companies, engage all the
milk from whole townships and turn out
millions of pounds of cheese by ma
chinery, which is mostly exported abroad.
This is said to be more profitable to the
farmers than butter-making, and il is Ger.
tainly far less troublesome. To this source
must be traced ore leading reason for the
growing scarcity Of good butter in our
market.
According 10 McCulloch, the butter OF
England and Holland is reckoned the best
in Europe, as in our country that pro-
duced in northern latitudes is superior.
In the Eastern States, Orange county
New York, and St. Albans, in Vermont,
have long been the headquarters Of prime
butter for expectation. Indeed, much but
ter is sold throughout the country under
the name of "Orange county butter "
which has no other similarity than its
rich, yellow color, to the delicious articles
turned out by the famous dairies of Middle
town and Goshen. In London the butter
of Epping and Cambridge is in the highest
repute. The cows which produce the
former, feed in the rich shubbery pastures
of Epping forest. 1t is brought to market
in uueer-shaped long rolls of from one to
two feet each, weighing about pound.
Yorkshire butter, which is produced in
great quantities, is often sold for Epping
or Cambridge though 1t is inferior TO it.
The origin of butter is lost in antiquity,
so remote the world will never know who
first invented it, Some people, indeed,
ready to settle all questions on the simplest
available principles, will have 1t that but
ter must have made its appearance in the
world nearly as soon as milk. Nothing
more than good shaking, they reason, is
necessary to convert the one into the
other, and the good shaking might, in the
first instance have been brought about as
well by accident as by design. This is the
a priOri method of accounting for things,
and certainly proves that butter might
have been early and easily discovered.
Nevertheless, those who demand his
torical proofs as the essential basis OF
their opinions, will find it difficult to
| believe that our first parents ever
tasted butter in Paradise, however much
they NAV have reveled in milk and honey
The learned Beckmann, in his History of
Inventions" tells us that butter, though
now commonly used in the greater part of
Europe, was unknown, or known very
imperfectly, to the ancients. He has taken
the pains to collate all the passages in
Scripture where it is spoken OF, and shows
that the word translated "butter" signifies
cream, or some thick milk, and could not
have been a solid substance at all. This is
proven by be texts themselves where 1t is
used "When washed my steps with but
ter, and the rock poured me out rivers of
oil" "He shall not see the rivers, the
floods, the brooks of honey and butter"
etc. The word plainly alludes to some:
thing liquid, as it appears that 1t was used
for washing the feet, that it was drank
like milk, and that it ran in streams when
poured out.
The oldest mention of butter land even
that is an obscure one) is found in Hero
milk oftheir mares, and seperate that which
rises to the surface, as they consider 1t more
delicious than that which remains below
It," This perhaps goes no farther than
cream, but Hippocrates, who wrote 400
years before Christ, and was almost CO.
| temporary with Herodotus, writes OF
cream, that when it is violently agitated,
"the Sat part, which is light, rises to the
surface and becomes what is called butter.
The heavy and thick part, which remains
below, is kneaded and dried, and is known
by the name of hippdee. The whey or
serum remains in the middle" Here we
have butter and cheese satisfactorily pro-
duced at least two thousand years ago.
But it does not appear from Hippocrates,
nor, indeed, from any OF the ancient writ
ers who mention it, that butter was ever
used as an article Of ordinary food. That
learned Greek physician speaks OF its emol-
lient qualities, and prescribes 1t externally
as a medicine. Strabo says that the Lusl-
! tanians used butter instead of oil and
Elian mentions that the East Indians
anointed the wounds of their elephants
with butter Galen writes that in cold
countries, which do not produce oil, butter
is used in the baths" Pliny recommends
il to be rubbed over children's gums in
teething, and also for ulcers in the mouth.
| Plutarch tells of Spartan lady who
smelled strongly of butter, by which 1t
seems to have been used as q perfume, or
ointment IL is never mentioned by any
| Greek or Roman writer as used in cookery
or at the table, ...
The people of Germany appear to have
| known the use of butter at very early
period, though how early is not known.
In that colder climate both butter and
cheese could readily be made and pre-
served, while in Italy, Spain, and the other
portions of Southern Europe, they are not
even now largely produced. As substi-
tute, the people of those countries have
always been accustomed to the liberal use
of good oil, both Tor cooking purposes and
for the table. In the Sopth of France
butter is sold in the apothecaries' shops
for medicinal purposes, and one OF the
grievances recounted by travellers in Spain
Is that they can seldom meet with butter,
In warm countries IL is difficult to preserve
II for any length of time, and II appears
certain that Che only butter the ancient
nations possessed was in an oily state and
almost LIQUID. The Arabs are reputed TO
be the greatest consumers Of butter in the
world. A cup full of melted butter is an
ordinary morning drink among all classes.
Burckhardt, the Arabian traveller, says
that the appetite for it is universal, and
the poorest persons will spend half their
daily income in order that they may have
butter at every meal. They make it ex-
olusively from the milk of sheep and goats,
while other nations use that of camels,
mares and other animals Cincinnati
Commercial.
Hogs VS.. Bugs.
FoR some time back the best and most