432 The President's Address at General Meetinfj. 



network of railways, at the other end of whicli He tlae great stei)pes of 

 Eastern Europe, from whicli the rinderpest is rarely absent ; and we 

 are placed in nearly as much danger as countries like Austria and 

 Prussia, which, geographically, lie much nearer to the sources of 

 infection, and which have only kept themselves free from most 

 calamitous losses since they have adopted very stringent regulations 

 as part of their permanent code, ready to be put into active operation 

 at the shortest possible notice. The number of store cattle im- 

 ported is so limited that it would not be difficult to establish an 

 efiicioit system of quarantine for them, and there can be little doubt 

 but that if it were once thoroughly understood, that in future all fat 

 cattle must be slaughtered at the ports of disembarkation, arrange- 

 ments would soon be made by which it could conveniently be carried 

 out, and I am sanguine enough to believe that after a time it would be 

 conducive to the interest of the importer, as it assuredly would be to 

 that of the consmner. Let it be assumed that convenient slaughter- 

 houses were constructed at the ports both of export and import. In 

 winter, when tlie passage is rough and tedious, and the importers 

 suff"er great losses by general deterioration and numerous deaths 

 amongst their live cargoes, they would slaughter the cattle at Rotter- 

 dam, Antwerp, Ostcnd, and other convenient ports, and during the 

 winter months the meat could be brought over in capital condition. 

 During the summer months, when fresh meat would not bear a sea 

 voyage, the animals must be brought over alive, but at that time of 

 year the passage loses half its terrors, and the cattle w^ould be 

 slaughtered at Hull, Har^Adch, or the port of London. Even now 

 fresh meat is becoming an article of daily importation, and from a 

 return kindly furnished to me by the President of the Board of Trade, 

 I learn that in the month of October last no less than three millions 

 four himdred and twenty-eight thousand pounds of meat, salted and 

 fresh, were imported, of which the greater portion var-, fresh mutton. 



The next question to which I shall allude is what has been termed 

 the labour difficulty. All who are engaged in rm-al pursuits are 

 aware that wages have risen very much during the last few years, 

 and that not only has labour become a more costly item in farm exj^en- 

 diture, but it is extremely difficult in many districts to obtain a suffi- 

 ciency of the right sort of men. Some years ago it was very common 

 to hear farmers severely blamed for not giving high enough wages 

 to their labourers, and now it is equally common to hear the labourers 

 found fault with for asking extravagantly high wages. In each case 

 the complaints are equally unreasonable. A farmer who should from 

 kindness of heart give much higher wages than his neighbours would 

 soon find himself in the Gazette, and it would be equally unbusiness- 

 like to expect that labourers should ask lower wages than they think 

 they can obtain. Several causes have contributed to bring about the 



