+-----------+--------+--------+--------++---------+---------+---------+ | | 1898. | 1899. | 1900. || 1898. | 1899. | 1900. | +-----------+--------+--------+--------++---------+---------+---------+ | | Cwt. | Cwt. | Cwt. || £ | £ | £ | | Butter | 63,491 | 50,453 | 51,583 || 319,806 | 257,999 | 258,931 | | Margarine | 10,023 | 13,139 | 11,326 || 24,721 | 33,319 | 27,882 | | Cheese | 56,694 | 56,390 | 55,982 || 159,210 | 163,991 | 168,369 | +-----------+--------+--------+--------++---------+---------+---------+
There is also a very small export trade in butter and cheese made in the United Kingdom, but its insignificant character is evident from the subjoined details as to quantities and values for the years named:--
+-----------+--------+--------+--------++---------+---------+---------+ | | 1898. | 1899. | 1900. || 1898. | 1899. | 1900. | +-----------+--------+--------+--------++---------+---------+---------+ | | Cwt. | Cwt. | Cwt. || £ | £ | £ | | Butter | 11,359 | 9,936 | 10,127 || 59,731 | 53,195 | 53,701 | | Cheese | 10,126 | 9,758 | 9,356 || 36,803 | 35,890 | 36,691 | +-----------+--------+--------+--------++---------+---------+---------+
The development of the dairying industry in the vast region of the United States of America has been described in the official _Year-Book_ by Major Henry E. Alvord, chief of the dairy division of the bureau of animal industry in the department of agriculture at Washington. The beginning of the 20th century found the industry upon an altogether higher level than seemed possible a few decades earlier. The milch cow herself, upon which the whole business rests, has become almost as much a machine as a natural product, and a very different creature from the average animal of bygone days. The few homely and inconvenient implements for use in the laborious duties of the dairy have been replaced by perfected appliances, skilfully devised to accomplish their object and to lighten labour. Long rows of shining metal pans no longer adorn rural dooryards. The factory system of co-operative or concentrated manufacture has so far taken the place of home dairying that in entire states the cheese vat or press is as rare as the handloom, and in many counties it is as difficult to find a farm churn as a spinning-wheel. An illustration of the nature of the changes is afforded in the butter-making district of northern Vermont, at St Albans, the business centre of Franklin county. In 1880 the first creamery was built in this county; ten years later there were 15. Now a creamery company at St Albans has upwards of 50 skimming or separating stations distributed through Franklin and adjoining counties. To these is carried the milk from more than 30,000 cows. Farmers who possess separators at home may deliver cream which, after being inspected and tested, is accepted and credited at its actual butter value, just as other raw material is sold to mills and factories. The separated cream is conveyed by rail and waggon to the central factory, where in one room from 10 to 12 tons of butter are made every working day--a single churning place for a whole county! The butter is all of standard quality, "extra creamery," and is sold on its reputation upon orders received in advance of its manufacture. The price is relatively higher than the average for the product of the same farms fifty years earlier. This is mainly due to better average quality and greater uniformity--two important advantages of the creamery system.