Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1876-08-09
What IN Butter !

Butter is a fatty substance extracted
this question. But what is milk, and how
does butter come to be a constituent of it ?
We are told that milk is a substance seereted
in the udder of n COW, and that it is com
posed OF water, casein, butter, sugar and
mineral salts These constituents of the
milk are all in solution in the water, except
the butter, which is dispersed through the
fluid in the form of very fine globules, which
have tendency to rise to the top when the
milk is left at rest. About these globules,
then, which are butter in its first stage
how are they produced from the blood of
the cow The milk glands contained in
the udder are, as TO their minutest parts,
composed of myriads of little sacks, called
cells. These cells lie surrounded by net
work of the smallest blood vessels, called
capillaries and continually grow from mat
ter which they draw from the blood that
flows along by them Their growth is first
simply enlargement, but when their full size
is attained they begin TO "segregate," or
"proliierate," that is, to divide or bud, pro
ducing from each mature cell a number of
little ones, in which the same process is con
tinued, The space allotted 10 these cells
being limited, as they continually increase
in number and size they must have AN OPP
portunity to escape, which is afforded by the
little passages called ducts, which lead from
every part of the milk glands towards the
pouches provided in the lower part of the
udder 10 receive the milk The mature cells
do not pass along these passages without rnp-
turing and dispensing their contents in the
fluid exuded from the capilaiies outside OF
the cells by process called "trausudation.'
This transuded fluid is the watery part of
the milk, containing in solution the casein,
sugar and salts Of the milk,
What is it that escapes from the cells
when their walls are rent 7 It is the butter
globules, which are, in fact, little, round
drops Of oil, since butter at the temperature
of the animal body is fluid.
II is stated above that the cells are little
sacks-that is, they have wall or covering
similar TO the shell of an egg, or the skin OF
apea. This covering, or cell membrane, is
visible under the microscope as a transpa
rent film, and there is no doubt about its ex
istence. But after bursting 1t dissolves, OF
falls to pieces and disappears in the fluid by
which 1t is surrounded.
II is usually stated that the oil drops
which escape from the cells have also each q
fine covering, similar 10, but thinner than Tia,
cell membrane and We have long been as
sared that the process of churning is only
process Of threshing these globules in orde
To beat off the membrane, which prevent
the globues from adhering together TO forn
visible butter But this is theory which
some Of the best observers declare has n,
proof, either optical or chemical, to sustain
it, II is theory merely, which probably
arose from the belief that without such a COY
ering the oil drops wonld run together o
themselves. There is, however, abundan
evidence that this is not necessarily 50. Tn
drops are able TO preserve their identity !