Cheese. The cheese of the East is made of cows' milk, though that of sheep and of goats and of camels is sometimes used. Instead of rennet, the milk is coagulated either with buttermilk or a decoction of the flowers of the wild artichoke; and putting the curds into small baskets made with rushes, or with the dwarf-palm, they bind them up close and press them. These cheeses are rarely above two or three pounds weight; and are about the size of a tea saucer. Oriental cheese when new is comparatively soft, but it soon turns hard and dry; and is excessively salt. 1 Samuel 17:18; 2 Samuel 17:29.