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112
MEAT SUPPLIES AT THE CENTRAL MEAT MARKET.
Deliveries of meat to the Central Market again show an advance, the total
of 421,927 tons being 6,012 in excess of any previous year's record, but,
satisfactory as it is to find the current of trade still flowing so freely in its
accustomed channel, it is to be feared that the increased weight consisted
chiefly of second and third class meat, and that there has been, if not an
absolute decrease, at least no increase in the tonnage of best meat sent to
Smithfield. This view will be confirmed by an examination of the Table on
p. 125 showing the variations from the different sources of supply. It will
be seen that there is a decrease in the home.grown, and also in American meat
killed in this country, which two classes comprise most of the best meat, the
increase being in Australasian and North and South American dead meat, from
which sources those butchers who sell low.priced meats are mostly supplied ;
thus the figures confirm the opinion, expressed by a careful observer, that the
feature of the year has been an abundance of meat somewhat poor in character.
That this not altogether satisfactory condition of things will continue seems
more than probable; the increase both in population and wealth in the
United States goes on a rapid rate, and the consequent use of an increasing
proportion of their own agricultural productions has brought home to their
graziers the necessity for adopting the most up.to.date methods of forcing
their cattle, so as to bring them out as beef at an early age; consequently,
during the autumn, we have seen at the Foreign Cattle Market, Deptford,
very fine animals, which have never been allowed to lose their calf flesh,
having, in fact, been fed for beef from the moment they were born, and
finally fattened and ready for slaughter at 20 to 22 months old, thus
emulating the finest practical achievement of the British agriculturists. It is
evident that this is not done without care and expense, and that animals so
prepared ("works of art," to use the words of a well.known Norfolk feeder)
cannot be sold at the same rate as those which have run about the prairies and
ranches until they have become beef, and which if they have lived longer have
cost but little in preparation; and it is significant as showing that the
food of the American citizen is no longer that which comes without an
effort, but they have to use the best scientific means of increasing the supply
for their own consumption, the portion sent to this country being merely
what they do not want for themselves.
The moral of all this, from one point of view, is that the United States
beef is of good quality and too expensive an article to be dumped on the
English market regardless of price, and we have heard of carcase butchers
buying home.grown cattle "because Americans were so dear; "the reverse
side of the picture being that if this high standard of quality was not
maintained the meat would, if sent alive, be in competition with Canadian
ranch cattle, or, if sent dead, classed with Argentine, in either of which cases
the price would not be remunerative.