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AGRICULTURE 185 began in the disastrously wet season of 1879. Pigs, into the United Kingdom for the purpose of being fattened, being prolific breeders, fluctuate more widely in numbers but under the Diseases of Animals Act of that year animals than cattle or sheep, for the difference of 1,498,552 in imported since then have to be slaughtered at the place of their case represents fully one-third of the highest total, landing. The dimensions of this trade are shown in Table whereas the difference is less than one-seventh for horses, XIII. less than one-sixth for cattle, and less than one-fifth for The animals come mainly from the United States of sheep. The relative proportions—as distinguished from America, Canada, and Argentina, and the traffic in cattle the actual numbers—in which stock are distributed over is more uniform than that in sheep, whilst that in pigs the several sections of the United Kingdom do not vary seems to have reached extinction. The quantities of dead greatly from year to year. Table XII., in which the meat imported have increased with great rapidity, a cirtotals for the United Kingdom include those for the cumstance largely due to the rise of the trade in chilled Channel Islands and Isle of Man, illustrates the prepon- and frozen meat. Fresh beef in this form is imported derance of the sheep-breeding industry in the drier climate chiefly from the United States and Australasia, fresh of Great Britain and of the cattle-breeding industry in mutton from Australasia and Argentina. the more humid atmosphere of Ireland. In Great Britain, Table XIV. shows how rapidly this trade expanded during for every head of cattle there are about four head of the decade of the ’nineties. The column headed bacon sheep, whereas in Ireland the cattle slightly outnumber and hams indicates clearly enough that the imports of the sheep. Again, whilst Great Britain possesses only fresh meat did not displace those of preserved pig meat, Table XII.—Numbers of Horses, Cattle, Sheep, and Pigs for the latter expanded from 4,715,000 cwt. to 7,784,000 cwt. during the decade. The column for all dead meat in the United Kingdom in 1900. includes not only the items tabulated, but also the follow1900. Horses. Cattle. Sheep. Pigs. Table KPN .-—Quantities of Dead Meat imported into the England. 1,152,321 4,848,698 15,844,713 2,021,422 United Kingdom, 1891-1900—Thousands of Cwt. Wales 153,284 758,386 3,432,516 228,097 Scotland. 194,538 1,198,086 7,314,997 132,413 Fresh Fresh' Fresh All Year. Beef. Mutton. Pork. andBacon Hams. Dead Meat. Great 1,500,143 6,805,170 26,592,226 2,381,932 Britain J 1891 1921 1663 128 4715 9,790 1892 2080 1700 132 5135 10,500 Ireland 491,143 4,608,443 | 4,386,697 1,268,474 1893 1808 1971 182 4187 9,305 1894 2104 2295 180 4819 10,610 United 1 2,000,402 1895 2191 2611 288 5353 11,977 11,454,902 31,054,547 3,663,669 Kingdom / 1896 2660 2895 299 6009 13,347 1897 3010 3193 348 6731 14,729 half as many cattle more than Ireland, she possesses six 1898 3101 3314 558 7684 16,445 1899 3803 times as many sheep. The cattle population of England 3446 669 7784 17,658 1900 4128 3393 695 7444 17,912 alone slightly exceeds that of Ireland, but cattle are more at home on the broad plains of England than amongst the hills and mountains of Wales and Scotland, which ing, the quantities stated being those for 1900 :—Beef, afford suitable habitat for sheep. Hence it happens that, salted, 194,668 cwt.; beef, otherwise preserved, 516,529 whilst in England sheep are not four times as numerous cwt.; preserved mutton, 64,452 cwt.; salted pork, 248,710 as cattle, in Wales they are nearly five times as numerous, cwt.; dead rabbits, 473,167 cwt.; meat, unenumerated, and in Scotland more than six times as many. Great 754,114 cwt. The quantities of these are relatively small, Britain has twice as many pigs as Ireland, but the swine and, excepting rabbits from Australia, they show no industry is mainly English and Irish, and England is general tendency to increase. The extent to which these seen to possess nearly six times as many pigs as Wales growing imports have been associated with a decline in and Scotland together, the number in the last-named value is shown in Table XV. country being particularly small. One English county Table XV.—Average Values of Fresh Meat, Bacon, and alone, Suffolk, maintains more pigs than the whole of Hams imported into the United Kingdom, 1891-1900 Scotland. —Per Cwt. Imports of Live Animals and Meat. Fresh Fresh Fresh Year. Beef. Mutton. Pork.' Bacon. Hams. The stock-breeders and graziers of the United Kingdom have, equally with the corn growers, to face the brunt of s. d. s. d. S. d. s. d. S. 1891 42 1 39 6 47 6 37 11 46 foreign competition, the aggregate importation, free of 1892 42 5 40 6 46 11 40 10 47 Table XIII.—J umbers of Cattle, Sheep, and Pigs imported 1893 42 4 39 3 50 0 53 0 58 1894 40 0 37 10 48 5 43 10 49 into the United Kingdom, 1891-1900. 1895 39 0 35 2 46 1 39 0 44 11 1896 37 10 32 Year. 45 11 34 6 43 0 Cattle. Sheep. Pigs. 1897 38 5 30 44 0 35 5 42 8 1891 507,407 1898 344.504 38 2 29 542 41 10 36 2 39 6 1892 502,237 1899 79,048 38 8 31 3826 41 11 35 10 41 5 1893 340,045 1900 62,682 39 7 34 138 43 0 41 9 46 10 1894 475,440 484,597 8 1895 415,565 1,065,470 321 The trend of the import trade in meat, live and dead, 1896 562,553 769,592 4 may be gathered from Table XVI., in which are given the 1897 618,321 611.504 annual average imports for the seven quinquennial periods 1898 569,066 663,747 450 1899 503,504 607,755 embraced between 1866 and 1900. An increase in live 1900 495,645 382.833 cattle has accompanied a decrease in live sheep and pigs, duty, of meat in the carcase and on the hoof continuing but the imports of dead meat have expanded nearly foursteadily to increase. Up to 1896 store cattle were admitted teen-fold over the period. The rate at which the trade in imported frozen mutton 1 Including Channel Islands and Isle of Man. is increasing as compared with the industry in homeS. I. —24