TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION F. 841 



public wealth in Europe increases four and a half times faster, as seen by comparing 

 1884 with 1848. The increase of debt is not necessarily an evil. 



3. Canadian Finance. By J. McLennan. 



4. On the Production and Consumption of Meat in Hie United Kingdom. 

 By Major P. G. Ckaigie, F.S.S., Secretary of the Central Chamber 

 of Agriculture of Great Britain. 



Few subjects come more legitimately within the sphere of this Section of the 

 British Association for the Advancement of Science than the food supplies of the 

 people, and few subdivisions of the food question generally have at the present 

 time a closer interest to consumers and producers alike, than attaches to an inquiry 

 into the sources, the dimensions, and the future of our supplies of meat. Although 

 the English people have ever been a meat-eating race, little statistical inquiry has 

 been directed into the amount annually consumed in the United Kingdom, or into 

 the conditions of the profitable production of meat. Attention has, however, been 

 recently drawn to these matters by the growing dependence of the British con- 

 sumer on meat reared beyond the sea, and by the losses, direct and indirect, which 

 have unfortunately attended the introduction of foreign contagious diseases along 

 with the live-stock imported from abroad to supply our lack of native produce. 



Only for the past 16 years have we any accurate data for contrasting the 

 number of meat-producing animals with the growing volume of our population. 



In 1868 the population of the United Kingdom was 30,618,000 souls, residing 

 on a superficial area of 78,000,000 acres, whereof 45,653,000 acres only were 

 accounted for as ' under cultivation.' It would not be quite accurate, however, to 

 suppose that two-fifths of the surface of the country contributes nothing to the 

 meat supply. Animals are undoubtedly depastured on many of the mountains, 

 moors, and marsh lands, especially in Wales, in Scotland, and in Ireland, which 

 are officially included in the ' uncultivated ' area. 



In 1883 the population had increased by 5,000,000 persons, or over 16 per cent, 

 in 16 years. Neither the so-called cultivated area of the kingdom, which appears 

 to have been augmented by 2,000,000 acres, or 4 per cent., in the same interval, nor 

 the number of meat-yielding animals kept by our farmers, have kept pace with this 

 growth of population. The cattle were more numerous in 18S3 than in 1868 by 

 just a million head, or 1 1 per cent., and the pigs by 800,000, or 25 per cent. ; but on 

 the other hand the sheep stock of the country had become smaller by upwards- 

 of 7,000,000 animals, or a loss of more than 20 per cent. 



No official data exist whereby to determine the average weight of meat 

 yielded annually by our flocks and herds at the two periods contrasted, but on the 

 basis of an assumed or standard yield in pounds of dead meat for each class of 

 stock, it is possible to present, as I have tried to do by a diagram, the fluctuations 

 in the supplies annually produced at home. Adding to this estimate the known 

 and officially recorded weight of foreign meat landed alive or dead on our shores 

 in each year, it is clear we possess for the 16 years, 1868-83, inclusive data from 

 which it is easy to construct a graphic representation of the changes which have 

 taken place in the consumption of animal food. We can thus compare the gross 

 increase with the increasing number of mouths to be fed, and by discriminating as 

 far as possible between the sorts of meat grown or imported, the relative consump- 

 tion of beef, mutton, or pig-meat, may be observed. 



The diagram I have constructed represents in each of sixteen annual columns 

 placed side by side the weight in tons of the year's supply, divided into six classes 

 of meat. These are, reading upwards: (1) home-grown beef, including veal; (2> 

 home-grown mutton and lamb ; (3) home-grown pig-meat of all descriptions ; 

 the aggregate of these three lower divisions showing, of course, the whole native- 

 production. The next Section (4) represents, equally in tons, the proportion 

 annually supplied by our entire live imports whether of cattle, sheep, or pigsj. 



