June 1896.] 



PARLIAMENTARY PUBLICATIONS. 



79 



against 27s. lie?, for wheat, 25s. 3d. for barley, and 18s. for oats 

 as the mean prices of the five years 1891-95 inclusive. It is 

 shown that three fourths of the decline in wheat prices, and 

 still more in those of barley and oats, occurred in the last 15 

 years of the 30 under review. 



Similarly, although only with the aid of the looser and more 

 imperfect records available, the average price of beef in the 

 Live Cattle Market of London was quoted at 49s. to 74s. Sd. per 

 cwt., and at the Dead Meat Market, 43s. 2d. to 65s. 4d in 

 1866-70; while for the last five years the prices similarly 

 averaged show 38s. 6d. to 65s. 4td. per cwt. at the Live Cattle 

 Market, but 28s. only to 58s. 4d at the Dead Meat Market, a 

 much greater drop in the lower than in the higher grades, and 

 following a lowering of average import values of foreign and 

 colonial beef from 57s. 3d per cwt. in 1866-70, to 41 s. 2d. per 

 cwt. in 1891-95. 



The recent course of agricultural imports is also briefly 

 commented upon in the report, and illustrated in the tables 

 appended. The statistical details of home and foreign agriculture 

 which fill this volume will be found to cover 110 complete 

 tables. Several of these give on this occasion information ex- 

 tended or differently presented from the statistics of previous 

 years, while in one or two instances, such as Argentina, Bulgaria, 

 Spain, and Uruguay, new returns have been secured, although 

 in most cases these official communications relate to dates con- 

 siderably more remote than those which are annually brought 

 under attention for Great Britain. 



Swine Fever. — Report of the Departmental Committee appointed 

 by the Board of Agriculture to inquire into the Etiology, 

 Pathology, and Morbid Anatomy of Swine Fever. 

 [C.— 8023.] Price 5d. 



Under the authority of a Treasury letter, dated the 7th of 

 February 1895, a Departmental Committee was appointed by 

 the Board of Agriculture (a) to review the experience gained 

 since the Swine Fever Act of 1893 came into operation, respecting 

 the etiology, pathology, and morbid anatomy of the diseases 

 classed as swine fever ; (6) to supplement that experience by a 

 series of experiments as to the bacteriology and life history of 

 these diseases, and as to their communication, either directly or 

 indirectly, from animal to animal ; and (c) to bring together the 

 results of the work of foreign investigators. 



With this object in view, the Committee directed that experi- 

 ments should be conducted bearing on the etiology, pathology, 

 and morbid anatomy of swine fever, and they also instituted a 

 series of observations on the clinical aspects of the disease, which 



