EEPOETS ON DIFFERENT DESCRIPTIONS OF FOOD FOR STOCK. G7 



of butcher meat, live or dead, has not, on the other hand, increased 

 in anything like the same proportion ; and as the consumption of 

 these has gone on with the increasing population in a greater ratio 

 than they have been produced, the prices of both have risen to an 

 unprecedented height. Acute and far-sighted men tell us that this 

 state of matters — the decreased price of corn, and the increased 

 price of meat — is likely, from the above and other causes, to 

 continue; and a general impression prevails that the British 

 farmer, in order to live by his business, or to compete on any- 

 thing like equal terms with his foreign rival, must now turn his 

 attention in a greater degree than hitherto to the production of 

 these indispensable luxuries of life — butcher meat and dairy 

 produce. 



It is universally admitted that concentrated foods are now as 

 indispensable in the profitable feeding of animals as are auxiliary 

 manures in the profitable culture of plants ; and it is of as much 

 importance to know the cheapest and best kinds of food to apply 

 for particular purposes, as it is to know the cheapest and best 

 kinds of manures to apply to particular crops. When we make 

 a tour through the northern and eastern districts of Scotland, we 

 find the farmers there feed for butcher-meat, and that they use 

 linseed cake ; and when we go into the south-western districts, 

 we find they feed there for dairy produce, and that they use 

 beanmeal. This is how ordinary practice — call it empirical 

 practice if you will — has decided; and he requires to be well 

 assured that he is right who dares to violate widely spread and 

 well established practices, even when these may have been the 

 result of mere empiricism. We may assume, therefore, in the 

 absence of other proof, that linseed cake and beanmeal are not 

 only highly nutritious foods, but also that they are the cheapest 

 and best (mixtures excluded) for the production of the sub- 

 stances for which they are respectively used. But while granting 

 this, it will still be evident that they can only be the cheapest 

 while they bear a certain relative price to other foods, and that if 

 this relation be disturbed, other foods may become cheaper than 

 they are. Now we venture to think that the relative prices of bean- 

 meal and oatmeal at present (1864) are such as to merit an inquiry 

 whether, under certain circumstances, the latter may not be pro- 

 fitably employed in preference to the former. It is manifestly 

 an advantage when a feeding stuff can be produced on the farm. 

 Now, although beans may be grown with profit on some farms, 

 yet, on by far the larger number throughout Scotland they are 

 not nearly so profitable a crop as oats, and on many farms they 

 cannot be grown at all. During the past two years, in common 

 with other farmers, we have been selling our oatmeal and buying 

 our beanmeal as usual ; but instead of making a nominal gain of 

 from 6s. to 8s. per load of 280 lbs., we have only got from 2s. to 



