1 Ava., 1898.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAM. 139 
Mr. P. R. Gorpvon thought he might claim the credit of being a hard 
worker, but he was never a public speaker. He had also to remember that at 
these gatherings there was a “chiel amang them takin’ notes,’ as he was 
reminded when a gentleman told him the previous day that he had been 
indisereet in referring to their chairman as a sympathetic Minister. He would. 
therefore, simply quote the words of Bobbie Burns, and say, “‘ You have been 
kind, and I am grateful.” 
Messrs. A. H. Benson and Joun Mauon also replied in response to calls. 
Mr. W. R. Rozryson (Toowoomba) proposed the health of their Chairman, 
and in doing so expressed his high upinion of the character and ability of that 
gentleman. He was the right man in the right place, a man who had rubbed 
shoulders with the world and knew how to manage men and things. That there 
was no doubt of this was evident from the way he had handled them at 
the Conferenee. With regard to another conference, he had understood Mr. 
Chataway to say that they presumed it was going to be an annual gathering. 
He hoped it was. He had proposed on the previous day that ‘the next 
Conference be held at Toowoomba, and, if it were, he could promise a 
good hall as well as a fine display of the agricultural products of the 
district. Perhaps after all, however, the College would be the right place 
in which to hold it. In any event he hoped the conferences would be annual 
affairs, as they did an immense amount of good. 
The toast having been honoured, 
Mr. Cuaraway returned thanks, and said he did. not wish to be misunder- 
stood. He had spoken as he had, mainly because he had felt it was his duty 
to consider the delegates for the time being as his children. These conferences 
were held not only for the instruction that was obtained at the meetings 
themselves, but also for the instruction that was gained in visiting a strange 
place. But if no more instruction in this latter respect was gained than had 
hitherto been the case, the expense delegates had been put to in coming from 
all parts of the colony would not perhaps be warranted, Mr. Gordon had 
been weak enough to say that they had a sympathetic Minister. He certainly 
did sympathise with the delegates, though not perhaps with all their resolutions. 
Before sitting down he desired to propose the health of those gentlemen who 
had given up a day to join them in their present excursion, and with the toast 
of “The Visitors” he would couple the name of Mr. M. C. Thomson. 
Mr. M. C. Txomsoy, in response, thought he could put them on the right 
track as to the distribution of produce on the other side of the world. He 
had heard that the middleman had bad a very rough time of it at the Con- 
ference. He was a middleman, and he would explain why he had become one. 
In the first place he became a middleman because he was a producer. He was 
one of those unfortunates whose cattle were tied up through tick regulations — 
regulations which should never haye existed. Some years ago he was con- 
nected with the management of the Lake’s Creek Meat Company, and he was 
sent to England to see why frozen meat had gone down in price, and also to 
et behind, if possible, the middleman. In making this journey he went vd 
the United States, and in this latter country saw that the difficulties Queens- 
land experienced in producing its raw material in a proper form hardly existed 
in America. In short, the Americans understood their business, while the 
Queenslanders did not. He then went to London to find the butchers’ 
ring that was said to exist there, but was unsuccessful. As a matter 
of fact it was absolutely impossible to conceive a butchers’ ring exist- 
ing in London. There were over 600 wholesale butchers who had 
stalls at Smithfield, besides which there were betwen 5,000 and 6,000 
butchers in London, and to think of the Smithfield men forming them- 
selves into a ring required a very big imagination. He had always found it 
well-nigh impossible to get even half-a-dozen men to combine. At least, that 
had always been his experience with pastoralists. When he had been a 
producer only, he used to think the middlemen got far too much out of the 
profits, so he decided to join them, and he had now been in partnership with the 
