ood many quarts of
cream. The woman stands beside it, grasping with both hands the handle
of the dasher, or plunger, which is worked up and down to keep the
cream in motion and so change it into butter.

In the beginning of the churning process the movement of the dasher
is slow, so that the cream may be thoroughly mixed. Then it goes more
rapidly for a time, till, just as the arms grow weary, the butter
begins to "come," when the speed slackens to the end, the entire
process occupying thirty or forty minutes. The butter collects in
yellow lumps, which are at length taken from the churn, washed and
kneaded to press out the buttermilk, and then moulded into pats. The
pleasure of the finishing touches makes up for the fatiguing monotony
of the churning. George Eliot, in the novel of "Adam Bede," gives a
charming description of Hetty Sorrel's butter-making, with all
the pretty attitudes and movements of patting and rolling the
sweet-scented butter into moulds.

We can hardly tell, from the attitude of the woman in our picture, how
far her work has progressed, but her expression of satisfaction seems
to show that the butter is "coming" well. The work of butter-making
varies curiously at different times. Sometimes the butter comes
quickly and easily, and again, only after long and laborious delays.
There seems, indeed, no rule about the process; it appears to be all
a matter of "luck." Country people have always been very superstitious
in regard to it; and not understanding the true reasons for a
successful or an unsuccessful churning, they attribute any remarkable
effects to supernatural agencies.

In the old days of witchcraft superstitions, they used to think that
when the cream did not readily turn to butter, the churn had been
tampered with by some witch, like Mabel Martin's mother in Whittier's
poem. Witches were sometimes supposed to work a baleful charm on the
milk by putting under the doorsill some magical object, such as a
picture of a toad or a lizard.

[Illustration: From a carbon print by Braun, Clement & Co. John Andrew
& Son, Sc. THE WOMAN CHURNING]

In Scotland, when churning was easy it was because of the secret help
of the "brownie." He was a tiny, elf-like creature who lived in the
barn and was never seen of men; but his presence was made known by
his many deeds of helpfulness in kitchen and dairy, for which he
was rewarded by a daily bowl of milk. Those who have read George
MacDonald's story of Sir