The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, Adapted to the Use of Private Families

same manner as horses, they will not only receive pleasure from it, but give their milk more freely. In Holland, where the greatest attention is paid to all kinds of domestic animals, the haunches of dairy cows are washed morning and evening with warm water previous to milking, and after calving are clothed with sacking. The floors of their cowhouses are paved with brick, with a descent in the middle, where a gutter carries off the drain, and the place is kept perfectly clean with a broom and pails of water. The filthy state in which cows are confined in the vicinity of London, and other large cities, and the manner in which they are literally crammed, not with wholesome food, but with such things as are calculated to produce an abundance of milk, cannot be too severely reprobated as injurious to the public health. It is also notorious, that vessels of hot and cold water are always kept in these cowhouses for the accommodation of mercenary retailers, who purchase a quantity of milk at a low price, and then mix it with such a proportion of water as they think necessary to reduce it to a proper standard; when it is hawked about at an exorbitant price. The milk is not pure in its original state, and being afterwards adulterated, it is scarcely fit for any purpose in a family. The first object in the article of food, is wholesomeness; and grass growing spontaneously on good meadow-land is in general deemed most proper for cows intended to supply the dairy. The quantity of milk produced by those which feed on sainfoin is however nearly double to that of any other provender: it is also richer in quality, and will yield a larger quantity of cream: of course the butter will be better coloured and flavoured than any other. Turnips and carrots form an excellent article, and cannot be too strongly recommended, especially as a winter food; but they should be cleaned and cut; and parsnips, with the tops taken off will produce abundance of milk, of a superior quality;