136 BOAED OF AGRICULTURE. 



entail cooking, and the result is not the supply of animal food 

 in a condition desired generally by meat-consumers. 



Numerous experimenters and patentees have resorted to anti- 

 septic salts in powder or solution, especially hyposulphites, sul- 

 phites and bisulphites, in order to check the decomposition of 

 meats, but as yet none have had any great success. The sul- 

 phites destroy the germs of decomposition, and sulpliurous acid 

 taken up by meat in proper quantity renders the latter very 

 capable of resisting decomposition. The whole list of antiseptic 

 agents has been ransacked for available articles to be used in 

 saving meats, and yet very few are known that can be used with 

 advantage. 



The greater number of investigators aiming to preserve fresh 

 meat have attempted to withdraw it from atmospheric contact 

 by enclosing it in air-tight vessels and displacing the air by other 

 neutral or active gases. The most perfect and most valuable 

 process ever suggested was that of Hands & Jones, which con- 

 sisted in placing meats in well soldered tin cans, which were 

 provided with tubes, and could be placed in a strong iron box, 

 full of water, in order to exhaust them with the air-pump. 

 Having exhausted a little, bin-oxide of nitrogen was poured in 

 to destroy the remaining oxygen, and then sulphurous acid 

 poured in to the extent of twenty-five cubic inches for every 

 pound of meat. The remaining space was filled with nitrogen. 

 Meats thus preserved in closed cans have been eaten in all parts 

 of the world, but the process could not always be depended on ; 

 the salts of tin would flavor the meats, the meat-juice became 

 expressed out of the muscular fibre, which was left pale and 

 soft, and a heavy percentage of the meat thus packed failed to 

 keep. 



My attention was directed to the subject for some years, and 

 I was so impressed with the importance of extensive investiga- 

 tions that I suggested to my friend Dr. Parkes, the well-known 

 and able author of the work on " Hygiene," that the British 

 government should aid, with a view to the solution of a problem 

 which promised so much for our densely-peopled islands. Tliis 

 was a matter of difficulty, and time rolled on until the Russian 

 murrain was imported amongst English cattle, and propagated 

 over our best cattle regions. I had previously insisted on the 

 defective nature of our veterinary inspectorship at ports, and 



