A CARGO OF ICED MEAT FROM NEW ZEALAND.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3826, 20 October 1883, Page 4

A CARGO OF ICED MEAT FROM NEW ZEALAND.

(Pall Mall Gazette) If any one desire a novel sensation, let him leave the haunts of AVest End life and penetrate the regions of the East to Avhere the Lady Jocolyn, a ship of over 2000 tons burthen, is now discharging her cargo of frozen mutton in the Aloloria Dock. Tho Groat Eastern Railway takes you therefrom Fcnchurcb Street in less than half an hour, and in return for your trouble, if GOOO carcases of sheep Avhich lately arrived in her direct from AVellington, Ncav Zealand, arc not already landed and sent oil' to SmithHold, you will behold tho solution of one of the problems of the age—the question, namely, of the supply of tho London market with fresh meat from tho Antipodes. It is only two years since this hoav trade began. It costs £5000 to fit a ship like tho Lady Jocolyn with refrigerating apparatus, Avith the result that rooms are provided for some lavo or three hundred tons of cargo at a temperature Avhich during a throe months' voyage, quite regardless of tho heat of the tropics through Avbieh the vessel sails after rounding Cape Horn, is never allowed to rise above freezing point-, and is for tho most part far below it. Tho dock labourers as they Avork at the (ask of unloading, pause now and again to blow on their hands, for they aro working in tho climate of an English Christmas or a Now Zealand July. The carcases, each wrapped iv a neat white shroud of sacking, and that again coated over Avith thick hoar-frost, are hard as stones. Though the main cargo is mutton, beef is also represented, and some turkeys and fish have also been throAvu in, so that Londoners may knoAvn Avhat " schnappcrs " taste like and investigate the merits of "king-fish." But tho main interest of tho cargo lies, of course iv the GOOO odd .sheep wliich four months ago Avere bleating- iv Ncav Zealand, and aro now, avc are told, selling for 7d a lb., as fresh mutton to the butchers in Smithneld. The carcases Avcigh from Go to 801b. The sheep arc a cross between the small merino lamb and largo Leicester cave. The mutton is said to be excellent, and some of it has already appeared on the AVcst End tables. The trade evidently admits of great development. To return, hoAvovcr, to our ship. How is tho cold produced by a steam engine of 115-horse power, which, setting in motion a "dry air process " machine fills Avith intense cold an interval which is left between the sides of tho iced rooms and the sides of the ship, and also fUls various channels or Hues Avhich cross and rceross tho main leaders. To maintain tho required temperature the engine has to be kept going thirteen hours, on an average, out of the twenty-four, and consumes each day about 2_- tons of coal. The burning questions among the shippers is whether the iioav trade, which Avill plainly be a large one, Avill be best Avorkod of steam or by sail \ Probably experience only -will decide. There is much to be said by both sides. A steamer will perform the journey in a little more than half the time by a sailing ship ; on the other hand, the Lady Jocolyn's cargo has arrived in much better condition than that of a steamer, the British King, which preceded her by a few weeks. There arc many other points in the argument. For the solution of the problem avo may safely trust to the energy and enterprise of the two great Companies, tho Shaw, Savillo, and Albion Company, and the Noav Zealand Shipping Company, whoso fleets now maintain the communication and carry tho trade bctAveeu tho colony and the mother country.