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highest. All this naturally affects the cost of machinery and 

 manufactured goods sent by the meat-buying countries to the 

 tropics. If, therefore, estate owners can see their way to increase 

 the world's meat supply, they will not only benefit the public gen- 

 erally, but, by lowering the cost of living, or at least by helping 

 to discourage its going still higher, they will benefit themselves in 

 more ways than one. 



The Ceylon papers, some time back, in speaking of the scarcity 

 of meat, reported that at Matale prices showed a rise of 120 per 

 cent, on November 12, for on that day there was only one ox 

 available to supply eighty planters and their families on the es- 

 tates, as well as the general public in the town. We feel that, in 

 face of such news, one and all of our readers who can do so, will 

 at once begin to seriously consider the rearing of cattle and other 

 stock for supplying their meat to those requiring it, in the same 

 enthusiastic and practical manner that they have done and are 

 doing with the planting of rubber and coconut pjilms for their 

 produce. 



Meanwhile, with regard to the supply of remounts for the 

 British army, matters do not mend. Mr. Walter Runciman, M. 

 P., President of the Board of Agriculture, speaking at the con- 

 clusion of the Van Horse Parade held annually on Easter Monday 

 in Regent's Park (London), told his hearers that a year ago 

 a government publication put the deficiency of young horses at 

 200,000, and then he added: "It is vastly greater today." 



Colonel Seely, M. P., Secretary for War, who also spoke, owned 

 that it was a fact that the government was faced with a great dif- 

 ficultv. The number of horses available for peace times did not 

 ■come up to the requirements of traction in war times. 



Meanwhile, as the Daily Mail reminds us, the horse-l^reeding 

 season starts about the end of Alarch, and the present one prom- 

 ises to be much the most disastrous known. Small farmers have 

 quite given up horse-breeding. The English government, unlike 

 the German and Erench and Austrian governments, has done 

 3iothing to remedy the defect. Unless something is done the 

 transition period, which Colonel Seely mentioned in his speech, 

 will end in the extinction of the British war horse. The horses 

 bred under the development grant scheme go for the most part 

 abroad. 



We feel justified, therefore, in again calling attention to our 

 article, published in July, 1912, on "Remounts for the T.ritish 

 Army : Can they be raised on Coconut l-^states ?" In face of the 

 above statements, made by the highest authorities, the question of 

 raising remounts in the Colonies should not be allowed to rest. 



According to the Journal of the Board of Ai^ricultiirc (Eng- 

 land), it was clear tliat when coconut jioonac was fed td cattle 

 the butter made from their milk was much firmer; tliosc, there- 

 fore, making butter in warm countries may find coconut cake of 

 considerable advantage as a feed. These cx])eriments were car- 



