TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION F. 843 



rise regularly with the growth of population, would leave a varying balance repre- 

 senting the home produce to fluctuate accordingly. I am, however, disposed to 

 think that there is quite as much to be said as to a probable fluctuation in the 

 amount of meat consumed by our people one year with another, as may be urged 

 for a fluctuation in the ratio of production from the enumerated herds of any 

 period, and at all events for comparative purposes I offer the result of my own 

 estimate, until by closer inquiries something better and more definite is arrived at. 



The lessons of the diagram as it stands, taking first of all the various sections of the 

 supply in detail, are these. The production of beef has been nearly uniform, after the 

 first fouryears, 1868-71, of the period. In these years our herds averaged 9£ million 

 head of cattle, yielding only 615,000 tons of meat a year. Since that time we have 

 never raised less than 651,000 tons, or more than 688,000 tons per annum — that largest 

 outturn occurring once only, in 1874, one of the proverbially ' fat years ' of British 

 agriculture. Clearly, therefore, the native beef supply at all events has not kept 

 pace with the population. The yearly ration of the British consumer, so far as 

 home-produced beef is concerned, was 44J lb. in 1868. It subsequently reached 

 indeed 47 lb. in 1873-5, but speedily shrunk again to 42 lb. in 1882, and stood at 

 42^ lb. last year. Until 1876 the foreign supply of beef imported alive only once 

 reached 4 lb. per head of our people ; usually the quota was nearer 3 lb. Since 

 that date the transatlantic trade in live animals has added materially to that figure. 

 In 1880, 7 lb. of beef per head was imported ; in 1881 and 1882, owing to a smaller 

 transatlantic supply, 6 lb. was about the total, while last year about 8g- lb. of 

 beef per head was obtained by imported live cattle. The salt beef imported is 

 quite an insignificant item. It furnished only -87 of a pound in 1868, and was just 

 the same in 1883, and only once in sixteen years has it reached a pound per head. 

 The growth of the trade in fresh beef is very different. This branch of the dead 

 meat trade now supplies England with more tons of meat than we received from 

 all the live cattle imported in 1868. The foreign fresh beef was then 227 tons 

 only, whereas in 1883 it was over 40,000, and a 10 per cent, further increase is 

 shown in the first half of 1884. From being but a fiftieth part of a pound per 

 head, it has risen to 2^ lb. per head. On the basis of these estimates it appears 

 that we eat some 6 lb. more beef per head now than we did sixteen years ago, the 

 consumption having risen from about 48 lb. to 54 lb. per head, but notwithstanding 

 this two pounds less of each person's yearly ration is raised on our own soil. 



The state of the case as regards mutton cannot be determined with the same 

 accuracy, owing to the failure of the customs Teturns to indicate separately the 

 amount of our importations of fresh and preserved mutton. In this case, however, 

 the reduction in home supplies is very remarkable. The year 1868 showed larger 

 flocks in the United Kingdom than have ever been enumerated since, so that 445,000 

 tons of mutton may be assumed to have been yielded from our pastures that year, 

 enough to give each unit of the population an annual allowance of 32£ lb. Only 

 in one other year, 1874, did the home supply reach 30 lb. a head, and since then 

 our flocks have been greatly reduced owing to the combined effect of losses from 

 disease, especially that known as liver-fluke, the low value of wool, and the 

 generally impoverished condition of our farmers, so that on the same scale we 

 produced only 354,000 tons of mutton in 1883, equal to a ration of 22£ lb. per 

 head. Nor has the loss in this case been supplied from abroad. The live imports 

 of sheep in 1868 were not quite equivalent to 10,000 tons of mutton or under 

 three quarters of a pound per head. This rose indeed to 30,800 tons in 1876, or 

 2 lb. a head, but the supply fell off again until 1882, when 31,000 tons were 

 received, and 1883, when 30,812 tons were accounted for. This is equivalent to 

 rather less than 2 lb. of foreign live mutton per head of our existing population. 

 The dead meat imports of mutton have never till the last few years been con- 

 siderable, and, as I have shown, they are not even now properly distinguished. The 

 special trade in frozen carcases of mutton, for the most part though not exclusively 

 from our Australasian colonies, largely as it has lately been developed, only 

 furnished three quarters of a pound to each man, woman, and child in the year 

 1883. 



The supply of what I have called pig-meat— i.e., bacon, pork, and hams — has 



