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The cheese-tub is large enough for a Roman lady's bath of milk. Against one wall are the whey-leads shallow, long, and broad vessels of wood, lined with lead, supported two or three feet above the floor, so that buckets can be placed underneath. In these "leads" the whey is kept, and drawn off by pulling up a wooden plug.
Nor, on the other hand, does he care for the country hoyden, whose mind and person have never risen above the cheese-tub, with red hands, awkward gait, loud voice, and limited conversation. He has read too much, in his quiet way, and observed too much, in his quiet way, also, for that.
To ride at that time was particularly pleasant and rare; and, forgetting how she had left poor Miss Fortune, between the ox and the cheese-tub, Ellen and the Brownie cantered on in excellent spirits. She looked in vain, as she passed his grounds, to see Mr. Van Brunt in the garden or about the barn. She went on to the little gate of the courtyard, dismounted, and led the Brownie in.
The new sights and faces round her, and more than all, Patsy's strange appearance, frightened Alice, who set up such loud screams that Miss Grundy shook her lustily, and then cuffed Patsy, who cried because the baby did, and pulling Mary's hair because she "most knew she felt gritty," she went back to the cheese-tub, muttering something about "Cain's being raised the hull time."
Sometimes on entering the dairy in the familiar country way, you might find Cicely, now almost come to womanhood, at the cheese-tub. As she bent over it her rounded arms, bare nearly to the shoulder, were laved in the white milk. It must have been from the dairy that Poppæa learned to bathe in milk, for Cicely's arms shone white and smooth, with the gleam of a perfect skin. But Mrs.
Van Brunt!" said Miss Fortune, drawing her arms out of the cheese-tub, and wringing off the whey "I wish he'd mind his own oxen. There was no business to be a low place in the fence! Well come along! you ain't afraid with me, I suppose." Ellen followed, at a respectful distance.
It is not confined, of course, to the gentler sex. No more striking feature of modern country life can be found. You cannot blame these girls, whether poor or moderately well-to-do, for thinking of something higher, more refined and elevating than the cheese-tub or the kitchen.
There was great peering and peeping from the kitchen window, as Valmai made her progress between the heaps of straw in the farm-yard to the back door, which stood open. The doctor's wife, who had her arms up to her elbows in curds and whey, looked up from her cheese-tub as she appeared at the door. "Dear me, Miss Powell! Well, indeed, what's the matter?" "Oh, it's my baby, Mrs. Hughes! Can Dr.
She put her rennet into the butterpan, and her skimming-dish into the cheese-tub. She gave the curds to the hogs, and put the whey into the vats. She put her little knife out of her pocket for fear it should cut love, and would not stay in the kitchen if there was not an even number of people, lest it should break the charm.
The stone flags ensure a cool floor; and the windows always open to the north, so that neither the summer sunshine nor the warm southern winds can injuriously affect the produce. It is a long open room, whitewashed, in the centre of which stands the cheese-tub, until lately invariably made of wood, but now frequently of tin, this material taking much less trouble to keep clean.
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