Anglers are untiring in the discussion of the merits of their various flies—Parsons, Silver Doctors, Sweeps, Durbar Rangers, Jock Scotts, &c. Yet salmon are frequently caught by what most anglers would call very unlikely flies, after declining to grapple the gayest and best. So great is this uncertainty, that many anglers maintain it is of little consequence what the fly is, if it is only well presented to a salmon when in a rising mood. Salmon have been caught in all kinds of weather—in calm and in thunderstorm; in rain and in brilliant sunshine; under white and under black clouds; with winds blowing from all points of the compass—though south and west seem best; even at times in sharp frosty mornings. They have been often caught with small hooks in turbid waters, and vice versâ. We have seen a twenty-pounder rise to a number two trout fly so small that one might suppose such a mite could never be tasted in such a mouth, and yet the salmon rose to it like a porpoise, though in a very small crystal-clear river and under a dazzling noonday sun. As to the play of the rod in salmon angling, fish are taken under all fashions—fast and slow, short or long lifting; while some successful fishermen trust more to the current making the play, and move their rods very slightly. We have seen an angler kill two large salmon and lose a third in quick succession by standing in one spot and holding his rod quite still. One piece of reliable good advice we can give to those who have not already learned it. Though an angler in a general way can form a notion as to what are the likely parts of a river, it is only by repeated observations that some of the best ‘lies’ are found out; and as there are favourite ‘lies’ occupied all the year round, and year after year, by the finest river-trout, sea-trout, and salmon, it is best to observe where the anglers who have long frequented a river, fish most persistently, as there the fish will certainly be found.
Salmon anglers—unlike trout anglers—should make few casts, should cast the line lightly, playing the fly quietly and persistently over the best parts of the pools only, and not wasting time over unknown water. Nothing so certainly diminishes his chances of a ‘rise,’ as recklessly wading where he may be seen by the fish, or casting his line heavily, and lifting it often and hurriedly.
BUTTERINE.
Professor Sheldon, at the great show of the British Dairy Farmers’ Association, tried to comfort some of those present by telling them that there was a great future for dairy-farming in this country. Whilst corn-growing was doomed in England, the consumption of fresh milk was increasing—it had trebled in London within the last twenty years. Both cheese and butter ought to be consumed in much greater quantities, for there was no article of food so cheap as cheese. He had no objection to butterine; only, let it be sold as such.
At the annual meeting of the same society, presided over by Lord Vernon, Canon Bagot introduced the subject of butterine, the extended use and manufacture of which is already pressing heavily on the dairy-farmer. He said he did not want to stop the sale of butterine; but he wanted the law so altered, that persons should be imprisoned, instead of being fined, for selling butterine as butter. He gave a bit of personal experience. He said he had disguised some of the Dublin dairymaids and sent them to purchase butter in eight shops. In every case, a receipt was given to the effect that the butter was pure; but on being analysed, it was found that there was not a particle of butter in any of the samples. One of these tradesmen had been fined five times for selling butterine as butter! A motion which he moved was carried—‘That the Council be requested to take into consideration the best means of prohibiting the sale of butterine as butter, and that they immediately take such steps as were desirable.’
Lord Vernon added his testimony as to the unfairness of retailing butterine for butter and selling it at one-and-sixpence a pound. He had seen enormous quantities of butterine in Paris, but there it was sold as such. About a month previously, he had been asked by a man to turn his dairy-farm into a butterine factory, by which he hoped to make ten thousand pounds a year.
Under the title of ‘Sham Butter,’ in Chambers’s Journal for May 15, 1880, the discovery and manufacture of butterine were briefly related. An ingenious Frenchman, M. Mège, patented a process by which beef-suet can be converted into butterine, and since then the manufacture has spread till we have factories at work in France, England, Holland, Germany, and America. In a Report laid before the House of Commons, it was declared that the substances so produced were harmless, and that good butterine was more wholesome than bad butter. In considering the subject, it must be remembered that there is good and bad butterine, as well as good and bad butter.
Oleo-margarine is the raw material from which butterine is made. It is procured in this way: From the freshly slaughtered carcasses of cattle in the abattoirs of large towns, the superfluous portions of suet are taken to the butterine factories. The finest, cleanest, and sweetest portions only are selected for making oleo-margarine. This prepared oil is largely exported from America to Holland, whence it comes over to us as butterine.
A scientific periodical describes the process of manufacture as follows. At the factory, the beef-suet is thrown into tanks containing tepid water; and after standing a short time it is washed repeatedly in cold water, and disintegrated and separated from fibre by passing it through a ‘meat-hasher,’ worked by steam, after which it is forced through a fine sieve. It is then melted by surrounding the tanks with water at a temperature of about one hundred and twenty degrees Fahrenheit. Great care is taken not to exceed this point; otherwise, the fat would begin to decompose and acquire a flavour of tallow. After being well stirred, the adipose membrane subsides to the bottom of the tank, and is separated under the name of ‘scrap,’ whilst a clear yellow oil is left above, together with a film of white oily substance. This film is removed by skimming, and the yellow oil is drawn off and allowed to solidify. The ‘refined fat,’ as the substance is now termed, is then taken to the pressroom—which is kept at a temperature of about ninety degrees Fahrenheit—packed in cotton cloths, and placed in galvanised iron plates in a press. On being subjected to pressure, oil flows away. The cakes of stearine which remain are sent to the candle-makers. The oil—which is now known as oleo-margarine—is filled into barrels for sale or export, or directly made into butterine by adding to it ten per cent. of milk and churning the mixture. It is now coloured with annatto and rolled with ice, to set it; salt is added; the process is finished, and it is ready for packing.
Holland has taken the lead in the manufacture of butterine; there are now forty-five factories in the country, most of which are in North Brabant, where the farms are small, and maintain but one or two cows. As the farmers there can only make a small quantity of butter, which is apt to spoil before it can be collected for market, they readily make contracts with the butterine-makers. The factories at Oss, in Holland, alone, send an average of one hundred and fifty tons per week of oleo-margarine butter to England. There are also several firms in this country engaged in its manufacture; one firm in London can turn out from ten to twenty tons per week.