Cattle, Catch-crops and Cover-plants 347 



be allowed to cover in a year, and having 

 ascertained that, keep him to such a number 

 and no more. This done, take note of your 

 calves, turn the indifferent ones out with the 

 herd, but keep back the best bulls to breed 

 only with the best cows, and have patience. 

 In a few years, by the time, say, your coco- 

 nut trees are in full bearing, you will have 

 a fine herd of picked cattle, the weight of 

 which, helped perhaps by fresh arrivals, will 

 soon come up to that necessary for the Eng- 

 lish trade. Meanwhile, cattle and meat are 

 always saleable locally. 1 Whilst you are 



1 The following paragraph, taken from Mr. Acting- 

 Consul Crosby's report on the trade of Bangkok (Siam) 

 for the year ending March 31, 1911, shows that coco-nut 

 planters in the Straits Settlements and the Federated 

 Malay States would also do well to take up cattle rearing 

 on their estates : " The number of bullocks exported 

 (3,022) is nearly five times as great as in 1909-10. It 

 is much to be regretted that the cattle-rearing industry, 

 once a flourishing one, should have dwindled to such 

 miserable proportions of late. Siam offers good 

 facilities for cattle breeding, and excellent markets are 

 to be found in the Straits Settlements, the Federated 

 Malay States, and the Philippine Islands. In-and-in 

 breeding, with its consequent reduction in the weight 

 of animals and their greater liability to sickness, is 

 mainly responsible for the present conditions. It should 

 repay the Government well to organize measures for the 

 control of breeding, the importation of fresh blood, and 

 the stamping out of contagious disease." 



In May, 1912, the wholesale trade in London owned 

 that prices, both of beef and mutton, stood higher than 

 for many years, and must continue abnormally high for 

 some time. 



