*5 



when the duty on all horned cattle amounts to 8 marks 

 per ioo kilos, of live weight, equal to at least 40 marks 

 per bullock or cow ? To this is added the embargo which 

 is laid on foreign cattle ostensibly for the purpose of safe- 

 guarding native breeds from contamination, but in reality 

 to exclude foreign competition.* No ruminant animals 

 may be imported from the United Kingdom, France, 

 Italy, Netherlands, Russia, America, Australia, and many 

 other countries, except, under certain conditions, from 

 Austria-Hungary and Denmark. As a consequence the 

 native race is left unimproved, and, with the exception of 

 certain districts, yields insufficient milk, and that of none 

 too high a quality .f 



It is, of course, impossible, in the absence of statistical 

 data, to estimate even approximately the damage done to 

 the rearing of live stock and the dairy industry by the 

 dearness of fodder and the practical exclusion of foreign 

 breeds. Indirectly, however, the results are seen in the 

 exceedingly slow process of expansion of these particular 

 branches of agriculture, in spite of the growth of popula- 

 tion and the rapid urbanisation of Germany. We find, 

 for instance^ that while in the period between 1896 and 

 1906 the area under the chief corn plants increased by 

 360,625 hectares, and that under potatoes by 249,211 

 hectares, meadow land only extended by some 42,000 

 hectares. Likewise we find§ that, according to the census 

 of live stock in the German Empire on December 2, 1907, 

 only the number of pigs increased in the period between 

 1892 and 1907 in a substantial manner, namely, from 

 12. 1 to 22.1 millions, or 82 per cent., whereas the number 



* Wurm, I.e., p. 143. Recently about forty head of German cattle, 

 carefully selected for the Argentine Exhibition, were rejected by the sanitary 

 authorities at Buenos Ayres as suffering from tuberculosis. 



t Gothein, I.e., p. 10. 



X Gothein, I.e., p. 8. 



§ Journal of the Board of Agriculture, June, 1909, p. 214. 



