she was never well, for "smiting" the butter was such dreadful hard
work it gave her a pain in her side. After this "smiting" is over, it
is put on a butter-print, and pressed with the hands till it is
considered to have received the impression. It is then, through a
small hole in the handle, blown off the print with the _mouth_.

I don't think I shall ever again eat butter which appears at table
with the figures of cows, flowers, &c., stamped on it. I should always
think of the process it has gone through for the sake of looking
pretty. Nearly all the fresh butter which is sold in London is made up
in large rolls, and, like that we make ourselves, need not be touched
by the fingers of the maker.


CHAPTER V.

WHAT WE MADE BY OUR COWS.

Every week we kept an account of the milk and butter we consumed, and
entered it in our housekeeping-book at the price we should have paid
for it, supposing we had purchased the articles. We did not put down
London prices, but country ones: thus, we charged ourselves with milk
at 6 cents the quart, and butter 27 cents the pound; at the end of six
months we made up our accounts, and found we should have paid for milk
from the 14th to the 24th of January, $44, and $66 for butter. The
food for the cows during this period cost us but $4 50, which we paid
for oil-cake, of which, when the weather became cold, they had two
pounds each daily. We do not reckon the value of the hay they consumed
during winter, because we included the land in our rent. We mowed
three acres, which produced rather more than six loads of hay.* [We