nally it got into Chancery where so many
lost causes end their days. The cheese was never heard of again.

While it is generally true that the bigger the cheese the better,
(much the same as a magnum bottle of champagne is better than a pint),
there is a limit to the obesity of a block, ball or brick of almost
any kinds of cheese. When they pass a certain limit, they lack
homogeneity and are not nearly so good as the smaller ones. Today a
good magnum size for an exhibition Cheddar is 560 pounds; for a prize
Provolone, 280 pounds; while a Swiss wheel of only 210 will draw
crowds to any food-shop window.

Yet by and large it's the monsters that get into the Cheese Hall of
Fame and come down to us in song and story. For example, that four-ton
Toronto affair inspired a cheese poet, James McIntyre, who doubled as
the local undertaker.

We have thee, mammoth cheese,
Lying quietly at your ease;
Gently fanned by evening breeze,
Thy fair form no flies dare seize.

All gaily dressed soon you'll go
To the greatest provincial show,
To be admired by many a beau
In the city of Toronto.

May you not receive a scar as
We have heard that Mr. Harris
Intends to send you off as far as
The great world's show at Paris.

Of the youth beware of these,
For some of them might rudely squeeze
And bite your cheek; then song or glees
We could not sing, oh, Queen of Cheese.

An ode to a one hundred percent American mammoth was inspired by "The
Ultra-Democratic, Anti-Federalist Cheese of Cheshire." This was in the
summer of 1801 when the patriotic people of Cheshire, Massachusetts,
turned out en masse to concoct a mammoth cheese on the village green
for presentation to their beloved President Jefferson. The unique
demonstration occurred spontaneously in jubilant commemoration of the
greatest political triumph of a new country in a new century--the
victory of the Democrats over the Federalists. Its collective making
was heralded in Boston's _Mercury and New England Palladium_,
September 8, 1801:

_The Mammoth Cheese_

AN EPICO-LYRICO BALLAD

From meadows rich, with clover red,
A thousand heifers come;
The tinkling bells the tidings spread,
The milkmaid muffles up her head,
And wakes the village hum.

In shining pans the snowy flood
Through whitened canvas pours;
The dyeing pots of otter good
And rennet tinged with ma