GrdwfJi and Development of the Trade in Frozen Mxdton. 215 
very differently in the two Australian colonies and in the other 
and larger sources of our frozen import trade. All but a frac- 
tion of the rapidly growing imports from Argentine and New 
Zealand are explained and accounted for by the frozen mutton, 
although it is true that in the latest year of all there is a notable 
increase in the beef exports from the latter country of from 
8,000 to 40,000 cwts. 
In New South Wales the preserved meat trade has, on a long 
survey like this, no doubt distinctly grown as a whole ; but that 
growth can only in part be accounted for by the mutton supplies 
subsequent to 1882, Indeed, the irregular course of the ti'ade 
here is its most remarkable feature. Only about one cwt. in 
every eight was fresh mutton in 1 883. About two cwts. in every 
seven was claimed as mutton in the following year. Not so 
much as one cwt. of mutton was counted in any sixteen of the 
exports of 1885, while one cwt. in every three was frozen 
mutton last year. 
The figures, however, of my Table suggest that, to some ex- 
tent, the mutton trade from Sydney is in addition to, and not in 
substitution of, that before existing in the "canned" shape. 
The moment the Victorian statistics are closely examined, 
the position varies. Here it becomes plain that the dead meat 
exports of sixteen years ago are things of the past. All the 
frozen carcasses which Melbourne sent us between 1882 and 
1887 never raised the entire meat exports to the level they 
stood at before 1878, and for the last three years the arrivals of 
any form of dead meat have been, relatively, very small, and, 1888 
excepted, practically all were mutton. Only 39,000 cwts. of 
any sort of meat were imported from this colony in 1886, and 
28,000 cwts. in 1887 ; while 33,000 cwts. of the former, and 
21,000 cwts. of the latter supply came as frozen carcasses. In 
1888 a bare 3,000 cwts. remained as the representative of a trade 
that sent us 139,000 cwts. in 1871, and 159,000 cwts. in 1872. 
The dimensions of our canned or tinned imports, in at least 
one of the sources of mutton supply, must thus be taken into 
account in dealing with the frozen trade. Speaking generally, 
few persons will probably dissent from the conclusions at which 
Mr. Clare Sewell Read arrived in his report on the Colonial 
Meat Products of the Indian and Colonial Exhibition in London 
in 1886, that, with falling prices of beef and mutton in other 
forms, a large consumption of common tinned meats can hardly 
be looked for. The convenience and portability of these pro- 
visions for exceptional purposes, for travellers, voyages, and 
military expeditions, will always ensure their use ; but the ex- 
tent of this demand must probably be irregular and spasmodic. 
