CHAPTER III. 



PRODUCTION IN RELATION TO POPULATION AND 



CONSUMPTION. 



SO far as animal foodstuffs are concerned, the consuming 

 population of the world lies almost entirely in three of the 

 above-mentioned groups, the surplus-producing (group 

 I.) the elaborating-commercial (group III.), and the deficient- 

 industrial (group IV.). The only important exception is the 

 coastal district of Brazil, where the population contains a consider- 

 able white element. Otherwise, outside these groups there is an 

 enormous coloured population living largely on vegetable food and 

 raising few food-producing animals. It is the white man who has 

 populated the temperate region of the world with the exception 

 of Eastern Asia ; and he has everywhere carried with him a standard 

 of dietary and a taste for flesh derived from his pastoral ancestors 

 and from many centuries of existence in meat-producing Europe. 

 In this standard of dietary animal produce forms an essential 

 part of the food consumed. 1 Further, wherever Europeans have 



1 It is interesting to note numerous historical instances showing connection 

 between meat-consumption and racial vigour. Since the days of Columbus 

 the meat-consuming Europeans have not only explored, but also colonised 

 or subjugated practically the whole surface of the habitable globe with the 

 exception of Eastern Asia. The Greeks and Romans, in the earlier stages 

 of their expansion, were pastoralists as well as agriculturists, and consumed, 

 doubtless, considerable quantities of, meat. Their decline, as also that of 

 earlier civilisations, may not be unconnected with the fact that population 

 overtook pastoral industries (see Chap, ii., above p. 8). The consequent 

 necessity of relying more exclusively upon cereals for subsistence, in the 

 absence of any extensive meat importations, may well have been an unfavour- 

 able condition. The comparatively greater vigour of the invading German 

 tribes from the North may be also connected with their greater normal 

 supplies of animal food products. 



The stagnation of Asiatic populations is probably due largely to climate, 

 but not entirely so, as shown in China, where large populations have con- 

 tinuously lived in the colder Northern Provinces. The recent remarkable 

 activity of the fish-eating Japanese is also a case in point, since fish supplies 

 the place of animal food. 



The physical and intellectual vigour of the ancient Hebrews may perhaps 

 be attributed in part to liberal supplies of meat and milk from their wide- 

 spread pastoral industries, and it is noteworthy that the more vigorous 

 colonies of modern Jews are considerable consumers of meat and other animal 

 foodstuffs. 



While there is no scientific proof for the above suggested theory, it seems to 

 be further sustained by a comparison of nations as they exist at the present 

 day. The Germans consume more meat than the Russians, the English more 

 than the Germans, and the Americans and the British Colonials more than 

 the English , and these peoples are in ascending order as regards nervous 

 vigour and driving force. The Japanese are a notable exception but, as 

 above noted, they consume large quantities of food of high protein ratio in 

 the form of fish. 



