TALLOW is animal fat melted and sepa rated from the membranous matter which is naturally mixed with it. When pure, tallow is white, and nearly tasteless ; but the tal low of commerce usually has a yellow ti nge.
A very large proportion of the tallow used for making soap and candles in this country is of home production, and is fitted for use by the renderee, who chops into pieces the fat and suet received from the butchers, and boils it in water, by which operation the greater part of the fat is melted out from the membranes, and floats to the top, whence it is removed by skimming. The remaining fat is subsequently squeezed from the membranes by.a powerful press, leaving the reembranouS matter in the form of a cake or block, of a dark colour, which is called graves, and which, when ma cerated in warm water, softens and swells, and becomes a wholesome and palatable article of food for poultry, dogs, and other domestic animals. It is extensively used in fattening poultry for the market.
Almost all our imported tallow is brought from Russia, where this article is produced in enormous quantities. 250,000,000 lbs. are annually exported from Russia to various countries, mostly furnished from the steppes of Southern Russia. The cattle are bought by thousands, driven to the 'Salgans, or tallow factories, and there fattened and slaughtered. After the animals are slaughtered and skinned, a little of the flesh and the intestines are removed, and the rest of the carcass, cut into pieces, is thrown into the boilers, of which there are from four to six in every solgan, each large enough to contain the flesh of ten or fifteen oxen. During the boiling, the
fat, as it collects at the top, is skimmed off with large ladles, and before it is quite cold it is poured into the casks in which it is afterwards shipped. The first fat which comes off is the best, and is quite white, while that which follows has a yellowish tinge ; and a still coarser tallow is obtained by squeezing the bones and flesh in presses.
An ox in good condition will yield from seven to eight goods (250 to 290113s.) of tallow, which is generally worth from eleven to fifteen rubles a pood—about lid. to 2d. per lb. The merchants of St. Petersburg divide the tallow which they receive from the interior into white and yellow candle tallow, and com mon and Siberian soap-tallow ; the latter, which is considered the best tallow. for soap snaking, being brought by water transit from Siberia. Yellow candle-tallow, when good, should be clean, dry, hard when broken, and of a fine yellow colour throughout. The white candle-tallow, when good, is white, brittle, hard, dry, and clean. The best white tallow is brought from Woronesch.
- • The chief uses of tallow are noticed under