A FURTIVE MILKING-TIME

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2718, 13 March 1916, Page 3

A FURTIVE MILKING-TIME

p—: STRANGE GLEANERS OF-THE NIGHT. Milking-time in the big Schuylkill River stockyards ill Pennsylvania is usually overlooked officially, for the little milk that might bo taken from cows awaiting their turn at tho abattoir would not pay tho company tor attempting to obtain it. 'But unofficial milking-time is. observed religiously by a few individuals, to wliom it is ol the utmost importance—the poor women or the district, who slip into the yards ill the dark of nigllt and risk their necks for a pailful of milk. To them it is a gift of Providence, for it costs nothing < -nd means nourishing food or money. Tho Philadelphia "Press" tells of these strange gleaners:— Of all!tho scavengers that gather about tho railroad yards in diftercnt parts of the city and pick upr wood and coal and vegetables winch arc dropped in unloading the cars, the queerest oE all are the women who milk the cows that aro among tho cattle shipped into tho big stockyards along the west bank of the Schuylkill River above Market Street. . Scores of women make their way stealthily into tho yards, often at two or three o'clock in the morning, big pails and milk the cowe that are tied up awaiting slaughter. It is surprising how many women go to the yards regularly for this purpose. They use overy method knc»vn to them _ to evade the watchmen, and crawl into the yards through narrow slite in the high board fences, or liioro often theyclimb over, the fences. Most of them live in the foreign settlements on the other side of the river, and m addition to having a supply of fresh m lk free thev chum it into butter, which tliej, sell, and many have a regular income from tlieir milking which, 'ielps eke out a slim livelihood for their families At tho stockyards little notice was paid to the visits of these milkers until the nlace was quarantined upon the out break of foot , and moutli disease. Then the milking of the cows had to he stopned lest someone should contract the Sisease Since then the visits of the milkers have been more stealth), and have been usually made 111 the dead of niglit, but the practice is continued as of old.