s my belief that the pretty
Swede is a sensible girl--that, to use a California vulgarism, "her head
is level."
The hogs are fed chiefly on skim-milk, and belong entirely to the tenant.
The calves, except those which are raised for the proprietor, are, by
agreement, killed and fed to the pigs. The leases are usually for three
years.
The cows are milked twice a day, being driven for that purpose into a
corral, near the milk-house. I noticed that they were all very gentle;
they lay down in the corral with that placid air which a good cow has; and
whenever a milkman came to the beast he wished to milk, she rose at once,
without waiting to be spoken to. One man is expected to milk twenty cows
in the season of full milk. On some places I noticed that Chinese were
employed in the milk-house, to attend to the cream and make the butter.
The tenants are of different nationalities, American, Swedes, Germans,
Irish, and Portuguese. A tenant needs about two thousand dollars in money
to undertake one of these dairy-farms; the system seems to satisfy those
who are now engaged in it. The milkers and farm hands receive thirty
dollars per month and "found;" and good milkers are in constant demand.
Every thing is conducted with great care and cleanliness, the buildings
being uncommonly good for this State, water abundant, and many
labor-saving contrivances used.
At one end of the corral or yard in which the cows are milked is a
platform, roofed over, on which stands a large tin, with a double
strainer, into which the milk is poured from the buckets. It runs through
a pipe into the milk-house, where it is again strained, and then emptied
from a bucket into the pans ranged on shelves around. The cream is taken
off in from thirty-six to forty hours; and the milk keeps sweet thirty-six
hours, even in summer. The square box-churn is used entirely, and is
revolved by horse-power. They usually get butter, I was told, in half an
hour.
The butter is worked on an ingenious turn-table, which holds one hundred
pounds at a time, and can, when loaded, be turned by a finger; and a
lever, working upon a universal joint, is used upon the butter. When
ready, it is put up in two-pound rolls, which are shaped in a hand-press,
and the rolls are not weighed until they reach the city. It is packed in
strong, oblong boxes, each of which holds fifty-five rolls.
The cows are not driven more than a mile to be milked; the fields being
so arranged that
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