the last year, having been connected with public affairs, to get at the influence which any body of men exercise on public opinion when their minds and purposes are united. I met a good many of you at the Legislative Halls in your interest. You were not able, we were not able,-I believe as far as I could, my thoughts run in the same line with yours to secure what we desired in the way of legislation on all that we asked. But there was one thing done; and that was the demonstration that when a vast body of men, like those representing the agriculture of Maine, are urited, they will be heard. It is only a question of time when their demands will be answered by the law-makers.

Thanking you for the attention you have given me, again let say that all we have is yours, take it, use it.

THE BUSINESS SIDE OF THE CREAMERY.

By Hon. E. R. FRENCH, Chesterville.

No more marked change in connection with the labois of the farm, has been observable of late years, than what is taking place in dairying. Once butter and cheese of some kind or quality were considered to be an indispensable product of every farm; at least so far as the wants of every farmer's family were concerned. A few who had the ambition to excel, made a specialty of it and got for themselves or their community a reputation for their butter or cheesemaking which became remunerative. The rule, however, was that the surplus, large or small as the case might be, went to the nearest grocery store to become a part of the heterogeneous mass that was put upon the general market; good and poor alike together, and often in anything but a tempting condition to the consumer.

This state of things no longer exists. The cheese factory has been in our midst a score of years, and now the butter factory is taking the place of private dairies. It has come to stay, and will multiply until the entire product of butter that is offered for sale will be made at the creamery; first, because of the evenness and superior quality of its manufacture, and, second, that the labor hitherto supplied by human hand is largely supplemented by machinery, thus relieving the farmer's family in a measure of what by reason of insufficient help, had become an onerous labor. Once the change accomplished and the former condition of things will not be reinstated.

Already consumers refuse the ordinary make of dairy butter; they call for the creamery, and the call is going to be answered.

Cheese making from the beginning has been conducted on business principles. What can be fairer than that each patron shall deliver milk of a standard quality at the cheese-factory to be weighed. as is each lot, and at the end of the season, receive his proportionate part of the cheese, or what it has brought, deducting the expense of making. This method has been eminently satisfactory as each one supplying milk was allowed to take back his proportionable part of the whey if he choose to. Generally, too, the cheese-factory has been built and operated by close corporations, whose interest it was to meet the reasonable demands of the business and patrons, while having an eye to a proper return for the capital invested. By this system of operations every man's farm is of greater or less value according to his convenience to the factory, which is in fact his market.

The butter making business as a rule has been carried on on a different principle, viz., by an extension of the co-operative plan to include the communistic idea of making things equal, by setting the butter factory down at every farmer's door. This in the end proves to be very unequal, and affords an opportunity for endless bickerings and jealousies.

Co-operation is a failure, unless the many are as one, except as a sort of charitable institution. As applied to the creamery, it means that each man's cows be as good as any others of whom he is a part; that they be as well fed and like fed; that the cream product be reckoned on the same basis, and by the same measurement. These are conditions that do not exist, we venture to say, in connection with any butter factory in this State, however near to it some may

come.

It may be said in reply to this "Let every man's cream be tested and paid for accordingly." Yes, this is very fine and all right in theory, but still disappointing in practice besides being fruitful of much ill feeling. The poor cream that you have paid for at a reduced rate, never comes to time in the churn, or if it does only to deteriorate the whole mass. Every dairyman knows that it is essential to the highest production that his cows' milk rise cream of like globularity and quality. Cream that requires from one to two hours churning to make butter is practically lost in the butter product

when mixed with that that is less than an hour in churning. The butter-milk gets the benefit of the mixing instead of the butter-tub. What is true of one man's experience is equally true of the creameries; as is evidenced by the large per cent of cream that it takes to make a pound of butter when compared with the result obtained by individual patrons.

To whatever extent the quantity of the cream product is affected by the fitness of the cow, or the kind and manner of feeding, the result is felt in the butter factory. This is especially observable when the cows are all out to grass and receiving little or no grain rations. No methods of feeding practiced have been found to quite equal the fresh June grass. When there is good grass and good water, and the cow can help herself to what she likes best and as much of it as she pleases, she gives the best results at home or at the factory.

If these conditions could be continued in the stall, much of the vexation and unsatisfactory results now complained of would be avoided. It is practically impossible to do this under ordinarily existing circumstances, and the selfishness of patrons makes it still more difficult of attainment.

It is claimed that by the separator system of producing cream, much of this unevenness of cream product can be overcome, as frequent testing of the milk will afford a basis on which to reckon each man's supply according to the quality of the milk offered. As a rule, the dairy business of Maine is not yet in a condition to use the separator to advantage. The cows are scattered over too wide an area. There is probably not a butter factory in operation whose collecting routes are less than fifty miles in extent, while not a few are seventy-five and even 100 miles of travel. The only feasible method is by establishing separator stations, but each of these will cost a thousand dollars, or half as much as is required to build and equip a good butter factory. For the present, at least, the deep setting method of raising cream must be practiced among us.

Like difficulties do not attend the manufacture of cheese for the reasons first that the proportion of caseine in milk varies but little in comparison with that of butter fat, and second that each patron delivers his milk at the factory where all is weighed alike. It is claimed by some that this method should be applied to collecting cream, and is, I think, practiced at some butter factories; each patron's product being brought in separately, tested and weighed on

delivery, but even this is not free from objection, as it only applies to amount, not to quality.

There is no way to make co-operation an equality but as already stated that the many shall be as one in their entire product. Butter making by the separator method avoids many of these objections, but not all; unless it is assumed, as some affirm, that an inch of cream is an inch of cream, regardless of breed or feed, this we positively deny.

The real business-like way to carry on the "associated dairy" is for a few men who have the means and ability to do so, or even one man if he is so disposed, to form a company with members enough to take charge of the separate branches of the work. This is already being done in some sections of the State, and the results are showing the wisdom of the plan. By this means business methods are applied to each department of the work; economy of both time and capital is secured. and being accountable to no one but themselves, they are able to make and carry out such rules as seem to them best suited to their business. The fact that what is good for one is good for all, is a conservator of their action, and a guaranty that the interest of all will be subserved.

Those willfully selfish or dishonest, or who do not keep proper dairy cows can be dealt with summarily, and if obstinate left out entirely, the same as a man is who offers an inferior article of merchandise for sale in the markets. There are some persons whose preceptions of what pertains to commercial integrity is so obtuse that only heroic treatment will help their infirmity. Touch their pockets and you will incite in them some degree of moral sense. When subjected to fair and honest deal in practice, they are ready to exclaim with the Dutchman who was analysing Gov. Hoard's test record in the butter factory: "Mien Got! Mien Got!? vat ist som on boy."

There is another feature of associated dairying in which morality plays an important part, but is not as easily interested, viz: the observance of the conditions by all patrons necessary to secure the best reputation. Thus far individual or private dairies have been able to command the highest prices in the market, and will continue to do so until all are inspired as are a few in the practice of absolute neatness in every detail, which condition cannot be reasonably expected until some radical changes take place in human nature. Gilt edged butter comes of gilt edged methods. The butter maker

cannot make it at pleasure, the end is only reached from the beginning. The one-half may attend to all the requirements necessary to produce it, but the shiftlessness of the other half animated by the thought that they shall get just as much, neutralizes the strict attention of the other half and degrades the whole product. As a rule, instruction begins at the wrong end of the course. The first les

sons should be given in the stable beside the dairy cow.

I will not forbear to allude to what is practiced by some in connection with their milk and cream production, especially the latter. I mean the use of highly concentrated and stimulating foods that excite the animal's productive powers to the utmost. It is just as wicked to milk a cow to death as it is to work an ox or drive a horse to death. It is more so; for it is not the muscular or secretive powers of the cow alone that is overstrained; her product as an article of human food is injured. The unnatural, fevered state of the animal gives forth a fevered product, and although the evil results may not be seen, the consequences are not to be avoided. A man working under the influence of alcoholic stimulants may be able to do an undue amount of work for the time being or undertake extra hazardous performances, but the compensations due to this will surely follow.

It should not be forgotten that for six months of the year, in this latitude, our cows live artificially, and the constant aim of the good husbandman to make it as nearly like their natural life as is possible to do. To take advantage of this forced condition of the animal to force them still further until their constitution and productive powers are broken down for the sake of larger present returns to satisfy our greed and avarice, is simply execrable. You may do it with what grows from the soil, as your orchard for instance, but to apply the same principle to animate beings as to inanimate, to deal with animal tissues as with soil, is wrong from every point of view. It is a fit subject for investigation by health commissioners.

We have stringent laws against the saie of tainted or diseased meats, why not for unhealthy milk or the butter or cheese that is its product.

The green grass state of June pastures is rarely excelled by any artificial feeding. The milk product at this season is excessive and generally satisfies the most grasping, yet the conditions are natural to the animal; life giving and health giving, if the change from the barn to the pasture has not been too sudden. Because an article of