The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1884-03-22
Ghe 9armer.
Butter Production.

Iilc IOliONtHS ID d paper Itdu UVlOiO vi
ney Grange by Miss Eliza N. Bentley ::
The first man who tried the experiment of
churning, and found his cream resolving it.
self into two articles: buttermilk and but
ter, both quite dissimilar from the original
article, must have wanted to patent his dis
coyery. But in how many countries and
in how many ways has butter been made
since The ancient Hebrew shook his
cream in bag of hide until he had the
desired result the South American still
pours his into leather sack, which he ties
to the saddle of a galloping horse and makes
his butter on the run. The dairymaid
of Holland uses the stand churn and plunges
her staff up and down in the cream. Our
great grandmother sat patiently with spoon
and cup of cream, stirring and stirring,
until her labor was rewarded with enough
butter for one meal.
Queen Marie Antoinette, of France, had
built at her country palace beautiful dairy,
where she and the fine ladies of her Court,
dressed in the most picturesque costumes
the artist could devise, fancied themselves
veritable dairymaids. In Germany, the
lords of creation use dogs or women to turn
their churns. In England and America
horse churns are common, and in the lar
gest diaries steam power has done away
with all slower methods. We all know
how many kinds of butter there are in the
world. There is the cheesy kind, the
crumbly sort, the butter full of specks and
NOTES. the butter that is streaked all through,
the kind that is helped out with spoon in
New Orleans, and the white snowy COM
pound, easily mistaken for lard, that one
encounters in Tennessee; the butter that
is like old Samson for strength and so little
goes so far, the butter that has dozen
tastes too many the oleomargerine that is
an excellent imitation and is no butter at
all. Many of us, in our wanderings by
land and sea, have encountered all the Diff
ferent kinds of butter here enumerated, and
most of us are fortunately familiar with the
rich, firm, yellow print, guiltless Of streak,
speck or blemish, fragrant to the smell, de-
licious to the taste, beautiful to the eye.
There is no point on which notable house
owners are more touchy than on the per-
lection of their butter, and that my butter
is as good as your butter, is almost evidence
that my grandfather was as good as your
grandfather, and that we both belonged to
the creme de Ia creme of society. 1t was
my privilege to visit, a few weeks ago, the
Darlington Dairy in Chester county, Pa,
where the Messrs Darlington make about
1900 pounds Of butter every week in the
year, for which they receive So cents per
pound from May to November, and 81 per
pound from November to May. This but
ter is sent to Maine, Boston, New York,
Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Savannah,
and in summer it is repacked in ice five
times before it reaches the most distant
consumer Stepping from the train on the
Darlington property, found myself encom-
passed by hills, for the entire farm of 600
acres seemed to be all hills and valleys, with
hardly enough level ground to milk cow
on, and yet on these steep inclines and in
the fertile hollows between 300 cows were
grazing.
| saw no Jerseys or fancy stock, the
Messrs. Darlington believe in the old fash
toned COW, with the crumpled horn. They
are constantly buying and selling and keep
no COWS over unless they are exceptionally
fine mixers. Besides their rich pasture
they feed extensively on chop, but had not
yet tried ensilage, though they contemplate
it. 1t was Monday morning and churning
day and riding away mile and a half from
the station, came to the summer diary,
part of which was the old building where
the present owners grandmother had made
the same excellent quality Of butter more
than sixty years ago. A portable steam
engine was putting away at the one side of
the low entrance and the Swedish Separa-
tor" an ingenious machine for extracting
the cream from the new milk, was whirling
round at the rate of 1000 revolutions min
ute. | always make it point to believe
anything of this kind and even if the ope-
rator had said 1900 times minute, l
should not have counted the revolutions.
Milking the cows four times day in Sweden
and churning once in twcnty-four hours, it
is not strange that this labor saving ma
chine should come from Il people whose
lives are merely dependent ON the products
of their hands. This new possession of the
Messrs. Darlington has not only relieved
them from the tedious process of skimming,
but, from the same quantity of milk, has
increased the yield of butter about two
hundred pounds week.
As soon as the milk is brought from the
COW it is slowed into huge tin barrel, from
this it flows through pipes into the separa-
tor, which is simply thick steel bottle,
about the size and shape of Il corbry, held
firmly in place and whirling with the ut
most rapidity The milk descending from
the pipe struck on the end of a sharp cone,
which rose from the bottom Of the bottle
and was thrown violently against the open
mouths of two little tubes, placed at une-
quail distances on either side the wide neck,
the cream being lightest escaped from the
highest tube and the milk through the OPP
posite one.
Every particle of cream is extracted from
the milk, which is, however, SO fresh and
sweet it is sold in Philadelphia every day
at higher price than ordinary skim milk.
The separator whirled increasingly, the
cream and milk poured out in steady stream
and in an hour and half the mornings
milking was reduced to two large cans OF
cream and about seventy low tin pans OF
milk. The portable engine and Swedish
machinery cost $4,000, but had already paid
for itself in increased yield of butter and
time and labor saved. | was quite horri-
fed to see the dirty glutinous mass the OPP
orator scraped from the inside of the steel
bottle when it was stopped, as the rapid
motion takes all the dirt out of the milk,
and the sight of this residuum has made
me very distrustful of any tactical fluid not
put through this cleaning process.
My inspection of the lower story of the
dairy over, went up stairs, which was also
a ground floor higher up the hill and nearer
the fine spring. Here [ found two large
churns revolving by steam power. The
two Brothers Darlington were busy work.
ing, sailing and packing 600 pounds OF