How We are Fed Part 3

I asked if the skimmed milk was used for anything. Uncle Ben gave me a cupful of it to taste. It was very good. He then told me that the separator takes out only the part needed in making b.u.t.ter, leaving all of the sugar. I did not know before that milk contains sugar.

The farmers take home loads of this milk to feed it to their hogs. For each hundred pounds of milk delivered, they get back seventy-five pounds of skimmed milk, besides the pay for their cream.

The creamery man told me that he made from four to six pounds of b.u.t.ter from one hundred pounds of milk.

The cream remains in the large vat about twenty-four hours before it is churned. The churn, as you see by the picture, is a great barrel made to revolve by machinery. It takes from thirty-five minutes to one hour to churn. The man told me that I might look at the book in which he kept the record of the churning. I saw that he made from two hundred fifty to six hundred pounds of b.u.t.ter at a churning. He said that some churns would produce more than one thousand pounds at a churning.

Not all of the cream is made into b.u.t.ter. There is left in the bottom of the churn a liquid called _b.u.t.termilk_. This is drawn off, and the b.u.t.ter is washed and _worked_ before being taken out of the churn. The working is done by means of paddles in the churn. It continues for six or eight minutes and squeezes the liquid out of the b.u.t.ter.

While the b.u.t.ter is being worked, it is salted. Some of the b.u.t.ter is unsalted, but most of it is salted. When b.u.t.ter is made in the home, it must be churned by hand. Only a few pounds at a time can be made in this way.

When the b.u.t.ter was taken out of the churn, the men packed it solidly in wooden boxes about two feet square and four inches deep. The bottom of each box consisted of strips as wide as a _square_ of b.u.t.ter. These were held together by a clamp, and the sides were hooked to the bottom and to one another. When the b.u.t.ter is to be cut into squares, these sides are removed and zinc ones take their places. In these there are slits running from top to bottom. Through these slits a wire saw is run, and so the b.u.t.ter is quickly cut into one or two pound squares. The b.u.t.ter is then wrapped in fancy papers upon which the name of the b.u.t.ter or of the creamery is stamped.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A Separator.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: A Churn.]

Of course some of the b.u.t.ter is packed in wooden tubs and s.h.i.+pped in that form. This b.u.t.ter is a little cheaper than that put up in squares.

CHEESE

I was so much pleased with my visit to the creamery, that Uncle Ben promised to show me how cheese is made. So one morning just after breakfast he, Cousin Frank, and I started out. After a pleasant ride of about five miles we reached the factory.

The first process here was the same as that at the creamery. After the milk was weighed it was run into great zinc-lined vats. There were four of these in the factory, each of which held about five thousand pounds.

Uncle Ben explained that the milk must _curdle_ before cheese can be made. In order to make it curdle quickly, a little less than a pound of a substance called _rennet_ was put into each vat.

A man worked at each vat with a long wooden rake, stirring the milk constantly. I saw a gla.s.s tube standing in the milk and asked what it was. Uncle Ben told me to look at it closely. I saw that it was a thermometer, and that it registered eighty degrees. A little while after I looked again, when it showed a temperature of ninety degrees. The milk is kept warm, so as to help it to curdle quickly.

In about an hour I could see the curd very plainly, but the men kept on stirring and cutting it. Presently one of them carried a piece of the curd to a table. He heated a small iron rod and touched it with the curd. When he pulled the curd away, little threads were drawn out to the length of half an inch or more. This he called the "acid test," which showed that the curd was in the right condition to be made into cheese.

Of course only a part of the milk had turned into curd; the rest was _whey_, that was drawn off and run into tanks. Each man who had delivered one hundred pounds of milk was given a check for seventy-five pounds of the whey. It is fed to hogs. About two hours from the time that the milk was put into the vats, the whey was drawn off.

One of the men now took a long knife and cut the curd into oblong cakes.

These he frequently lifted and turned over. After continuing this for about twenty minutes, the pieces of curd were put into a small mill, placed on a board over the vat, and the curd was chopped into strips from one to six inches long and from one-half an inch to an inch thick.

Salt was scattered over the ma.s.s by one man, while another pitched it about with a three-p.r.o.nged wooden fork. The man told me that he used three pounds of salt to each thousand pounds of milk.

Next, a piece of cloth was placed on a board about sixteen inches square. Two circular metal frames or bands, about six inches high, were fitted one within the other and placed on the cloth. The frame was filled with curd, covered by a cloth, and another set placed on top of it until there were five. They were then put on a table directly under a block which was fastened to a screw. By turning the screw the block was pressed against the top board, and so each frame of curd was pressed. I saw the whey running out as the squeezing went on. The superintendent told us that the curd would be left in the press until the next day.

We were then taken into the room where the cheese "ripens." Here we saw large racks reaching nearly to the ceiling, filled with double rows of cheeses. The smallest ones weighed but three pounds, while the largest weighed fifty pounds. It may take but a few days and it may take many months to "ripen" a cheese. It depends upon the flavor wanted. The man said that in England "strong" cheese is generally liked, while in our country "mild" cheese is preferred.

I asked how much cheese five thousand pounds of milk would make, and was told that it would make between four and five hundred pounds.

On the way home Uncle Ben told us that although our country is a great dairy country, we import certain kinds of cheese from Europe. He told us how the Swiss people pasture their cattle on the steep mountain sides, and that in every little mountain valley cheese is made, some of which finds its way over the mountains and across the sea to the United States.

THE FIs.h.i.+NG INDUSTRY

Have you ever stood by the side of a stream and watched the fish dart from one shadow of overhanging rock into another, or swim lazily at the bottom of some deep pool? How gracefully they move and turn! How like water jewels they flash as the sunlight falls upon them!

Most streams and lakes, like the ocean, contain fish. So we have fresh-water and salt-water fish. There are a few bodies of water so full of salt that fish cannot live in them. Do you know of any such bodies of water?

Most of the fish used as food come from the ocean. In this, and in most other countries, there are many men who do nothing but fish, in order that other people may be supplied with this sort of food. They do not depend upon hook and line alone, but use nets also.

Nets are great sacks made of cord, knotted or woven together in such a way as to leave s.p.a.ces or _meshes_. These meshes are not big enough to allow large fish to escape. Sometimes the fishermen go out in rowboats some distance from sh.o.r.e and then throw the net into the water. Corks or floats keep the upper edge of the net near the surface, while weights hold the lower edge on the bottom. Ropes are fastened to each end, and so it is drawn toward the sh.o.r.e. How the fishermen wish that they could see to the bottom of the restless water and know what their harvest is to be! When the boats have almost reached the sh.o.r.e, horses are sometimes driven into the water and hitched to the ropes. At last the net is dragged out upon the sands and the uncertainty is past.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 18.--Drying Nets.]

Look! Within the folds of the net is a countless number of fishes, each jumping, squirming, wriggling, trying to get back to its ocean home.

They are of many sizes, shapes, and colors. Those not good for food, together with the smallest ones, are thrown back into the water.

Sometimes a net called a "dip-net" is dropped from a fis.h.i.+ng schooner and drawn about a "school" of fish. I have seen many barrels of fish brought up at one time in this way.

The fishermen keep a close watch for the appearance of these "schools,"

you may be sure. Whales and dolphins pursue them, and gulls and cormorants circle overhead, for they, too, are fishers. Their appearance helps the men to tell where the "schools" are. There is a great rush for the fis.h.i.+ng grounds when they are sighted. The white-sailed schooners skim over the waters almost like a flock of birds.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 19.--A Fis.h.i.+ng Schooner.]

Large quant.i.ties of fish are caught by a method called _trawl fis.h.i.+ng_.

This may be carried on miles from the sh.o.r.e. How do you suppose it is done? To a very long and strong line, many shorter ones, each with a hook at the end, are attached. These lines, to which large buoys are fastened, are left in the water for several hours, and then fishermen in flat-bottomed boats called _dories_ row out from the schooner and examine them. The lines are then reset and the fish taken to the schooner to be dressed. This is a common method of catching codfish, which is carried on during summer and winter alike. Storms and fogs are likely to occur while the men are out in their little boats, making their work full of danger as well as of hards.h.i.+p.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 20.--Splitting Codfish.]

Many of the fish are packed in ice and sold fresh, while others are cured on the boats or on sh.o.r.e. Some of the fis.h.i.+ng schooners carry great quant.i.ties of salt when they start out on a trip. The fish are dressed and packed in this. Sometimes they are packed in brine, and along the sh.o.r.es of some countries they are strung on poles to dry.

Codfish are dried in great quant.i.ties along the New England coast by placing them on frames made of strips of wood and raised a little above the wharf, so that the air can circulate freely. When the skin and bones are removed and the flesh cut into strips, it is called "shredded"

codfish.

The princ.i.p.al food-fish are the cod, mackerel, herring, halibut, shad, salmon, sardines, and whitefish. Whitefish are caught in the Great Lakes. To this list the lobster may be added, although it is not a fish.

A common method of catching lobsters is to sink a box made of lath to the bottom, where they crawl about on the rocks. A fish head is placed in the box for bait. The lobsters crawl in and are likely to remain until the box is examined.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 21.--Drying Codfish.]

Lobster steamers, fitted up with tanks containing salt water, run from Nova Scotia and Newfoundland to Boston and New York. Here those not wanted are placed on cars containing similar tanks and sent to interior cities. In this way fresh lobsters are served thousands of miles from where they were caught.

A lobster that would cost us from twenty-five to seventy-five cents brings the fisherman not more than ten cents.

Along our New England coast there are many towns engaged extensively in fis.h.i.+ng. Portland, Gloucester, Boston, and Provincetown are among the number. Gloucester is the most important fis.h.i.+ng town in the United States. From it fis.h.i.+ng schooners go as far as Newfoundland, Greenland, Iceland, and even to the coast of Ireland. There are also important fisheries on the Pacific coast, from San Francisco to Alaska. Here the salmon are taken in great numbers. They weigh from twenty to one hundred pounds. The fish are canned and s.h.i.+pped to all parts of the country.

Besides being caught in nets and traps and on lines many are caught in "fish wheels." These are fastened to the stern of a boat and revolve in the water. The fish are caught in pockets and dropped in the boat as the wheel brings them up over it.