36 WINTER BEEF 



This must not be regarded as disparagement of the salesman's 

 craft; on the contrary, it cannot be too strongly emphasized 

 that a good middleman well earns his place in the world. But 

 there were too many middlemen earning a living out of the 

 cattle trade before the war; many instances could be quoted 

 of too many small commissions being taken off each beast 

 between the producer and the consumer. Between the departure 

 of the animal from his homestead and the final transaction 

 between the retail butcher and his customer the producer paid 

 money to one man for selling, to another for buying, to another 

 for "leaving" a bullock but it was partly the producer's own 

 fault. 



Having for 20 years before the war had good opportunity 

 to study cattle-markets, a study which gave me much interest 

 and pleasure besides satisfying a legitimate professional curiosity, 

 I have some confidence in criticizing the many practices which, 

 it is hoped, may be improved in- the future. Over and over again 

 I have gone to markets to find the primest " Norfolks >J1 supplied 

 in such large numbers as to force their price down to the level 

 almost of inferior, or of " chilled," or of " port-killed " beef. Many 

 cooks and housewives have no real knowledge of the quality 

 of meat and so the number of customers willing to pay for the 

 best is strictly limited ; further, the large joints from these beasts 

 are not sizeable for small families, so that the real demand came 

 mainly from good restaurants; from county and railway hotels 

 with a reputation for good food, and from the tables of such 

 owners of big houses as had enough money and knowledge to 

 insist upon being served with first-quality joints from the 

 "sides" of large, prime bullocks. Such customers did not of 

 course pay more than they were obliged to pay for the goods 

 they required. When the supply of meat was greater than their 

 customers' demands, the butchers were too business-like to 

 give more than the price current for all classes of meat, good, 



1 1 think there may be a double reason for the fine fat beasts being often 

 called Norfolk bullocks. In the first place that county sends them out in 

 great quantity and of superb quality; also, they are particularly the produce 

 from farms on which the "Norfolk" rotation is practised. This system of 

 farming imposes 25 per cent, of "root" crops on the land, and the greater 

 part of these is consumed by the large bullocks in winter. 



