AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST 
Farm., Grarden, and. PIonseliolcL. 
"Aei£IO0LTCUE IS THE MOST nE.VLTlIFCL, MOST CSEPCL. AM> MOST NOIILE EMPLOTIIEST OP MAN."— Wi8nn.<3To>r. 
ORAXGE JUDD COMPANY, 1 ESTABLISHED. IN 1842. ^l^^tel.lVi^.Ioli^-^I^n^^ii'J^y.: 
Office, 245 BROADWAY. ) PnbUsbed aUo iu German at same rates as in EaglisU. | ^e"ip*ifo"1or 1foT.e!-Stag.e\Nrjr:\r 
Entered according to Act of Congi-ess, in April, 1ST7, by the Orange JtJDD Cojitaxy. at the Office of the Librarian Gf Congress, at Washiugton. 
VOLUME XXXVI.— No. 5. 
NE^VST YORK, MAY, 1877. 
NEW SERIES— No. 364. 
THE FOREIGN MEAT TRADE. 
■ Drairn anrl Engraved for the Amertcail AgricnUm-ist. 
We have frequently referred to this new husinees 
of exporting beet and mutton, which promises 
to have a most important inflncnce on our system 
of agrriculture. That our readers may have some 
idea how this business is carried on, we have pre- 
pared the accompanying engravings, to ilhistrate 
the methods of preparing the meat. In figure 1 is 
shown the scales where the cattle arc weighed, not 
singly, but in a drove of 10 or 50 at once. This 
scale has a capacity of 100,000 lbs., which is equal 
to the weight of 50 head of 3,000 lbs. each. None 
but the best c.ittle are taken for this trade, and 
most of them will go over ],.W0 lbs. each. When 
weighed, the drove is taken to the slaughter pens, 
as shown in figure 3, and when there are very rapid- 
ly reduced to beef. The method of preparing the 
carcasses is shown at figure 3. A steer is hitched 
by the hind legs to a rope, and is instantly hoisted 
ont of the pen on to the dressing floor, where it is 
killed, skinned, and halved. The .sides of beef are 
moved to a cool room, to hang for a few hours, 
and the quarters are then sown up in canvass bags, 
after which they are removed to the steamship, and 
hung up in the refrigerator, (see fig. 4). The re- 
frigerator (fig. .">, page 169) is an air-tight compart- 
ment, lined with non-condueting felt ; hi the center 
of it is an ioe-house, seen in the engraving. A cur- 
rent of air is drawn into the ice-house bv means of a 
fan, operated hy a steam engine. The air, cooled by 
pas.sing through the ice. Is forced out at the bottom 
of the icecbnmber, through ventilators, (seen in 
licure 4,1 and after making the circuit of the room, 
and cooling the meat, the air-current is drawn out 
through a door at the upper part of the room, (also 
seen in figure 4,) and is again forced through the 
ice, and then again through the meat-room. What- 
ever moisture is g-.ithcred by the air from the meat, 
is coDdcQscd in the pipes which pass through the 
ice, and escapes along with the waste water from 
the ice through the drain, shown in the plan, fig. 5. 
In this way the air is cooled, dried, and purified, 
and the meat, kept in the most perfect condition, 
reaches its destination in far better order, than it 
frequently appeal's in at the shops in this country. 
The favor with which this exjiorted meat— mutton 
as well as hecf— is received in England, is aguaran- 
tee that the business will increase as long as we can 
produce the cattle and sheep at the price at which 
they now sell in the market. It is very certain that 
the prices of beef would dceliuc rapidly here, if it 
were not that the surplus is thus exported ; a-s so 
many as 2.000 head of heavy cattle, taken from our 
markets in a week, must necessarily ha\o a ten- 
dency to lower prices. If they were all to bo sold 
here on an overstocked market. This fact, and that 
there is a profit now in the business, would show 
that the trade is likely to continue and increase. . 
