PRESERVATION OF MEAT.

Southland Times, Issue 1001, 10 August 1868, Page 3

PRESERVATION OF MEAT.

(From the "Argus. ) There is perhaps no subject which at the present time is exciting more interest than the question how the surplus meat of one country can best be made available for the supply of the w.ants of other less favored portions of the world. The vast plains of South America teem with millions of cattle, thousands of which are annually slaughtered for their hides alone ; whilst in the several colonies of Australia meat is to plentiful that, for the first time since the discovery of the goldfields, boil-ing-down has become an established industry. Whilst such is the state of affairs in some paats of the globe, in others there is an alarming and constantly increasing deficiency of meat as an article of food. The national meat supply of England is now regarded as a matter of vital importance to the welfare of the country, and some of the most celebrated amongst the scientific men of the day have been directing their attention to the manner in which the deficiency can be best supplied. In a paper read before the Society of Arts, in February last, Mr Wentworth L. Scott estimates that at the most moderate computation the deficiency in the supply of meat, for London alone, amounts to 102,000,0001 b. per annum, whilst, tin order that the population of Great Britain should be well and properly fed, he calculates that an addition to the existing meat supply would be required of 3,544,330,0001 b. annually. If we except a few years during the great European war, meat since 1865 has been dearer in England than has ever been known before. In 1735 the contract price for the supply of Greenwich Hospital was 16s lid per cwt. — the tender accepted on the Ist of January last was at the rate of £3 10s per cwt. Since the years 1850 and 1851 the prices of beef and mutton in the London market have increased 33 and 36 per cent, respectively. The question, however, does not resolve itself into one .affecting the mere cost of living. With a large proportion of the Home population it is a question of being able to support life at all. Dr Earr, in a paper read some time since, before the Statistical Society of London, demonstrated that, taking all England, for every 13 deaths that occurred in the 10 years when the average price of wheat was low, 14 occurred when corn was dear. Mr Scott tells us that the meat statistics point in the same direction — " that the rate of mortality rises with the cost of

food staples, or, in other words, that they who take a fraction of the price of meat j save the lives of thousands of their countrymen." It is estimated that in Great Britian 23,000 persons die annually from insufficiency of food ; and even this is not the end of the evil, for it is a wellestablished fact that the energy, industry, intelligence, welfare, and wealth of a people, must depend upon a proper standard of nutrition being maintained. That such a state of things as we have but partially described should exist, that persons should be dying in one part of the world for want of a substance which in another is so plentiful as, comparatively speaking, to be almost worthless, is eertaily a strange anomaly. Some attempts have been made to remedy it, but none have been equal to the occasion. The difficulty of preserving meat in a condition fit for human food has hitherto presented an almost insurmountable obstacle to supplying the wants of one country by the produce of another. Something has been done by the old plan of pickling in brine, and something by means of meat preserved in hermeticallysealed tins. Neither of these plans, however, supplies the want. Meat preserved by the former method loses a large portion of its most nourishing and valuable constituents, and is not nearly so wholesome as an article of food. Besides, in hot climates, such as South America and Australia, it is very difficult at certain seasons of the year to cure meat, even with salt, and a very considerable per centage must be "written off for loss occasioned by tainted parcels. The process of preserving in air-tight tins is also too expensive to permit of its being earned out on a scale of sufficient magnitude to have any effect on the meat supply of Great Britain. In fact, until within the last few months, no practical or feasible plan had been suggested by which the famishing thousands of Great Britain and of other European countries could be fed by the surplus stock of America and Australia. Such a plan, however, is now before us ; and if all that has been prognosticated concerning it — and apparently on very good groundsproves correct, an entire revolution will be effected in the meat markets of the world. Bi-sulphite of Jime has been used for some little time, in order to prevent acetous fermentation in wine and beer. This agents now being employed to preserve meat, and all the experiments hitherto tried have been followed with the most remarkable success. A patent for the new process has been taken out by Messrs Medlock and Bailey, of London, and it bids fair soon to be in common . use in every quarter of the world. There is no mystery about it. Any housewife can preserve a leg of mutton by the process in a couple of minutes, and it is as efficacious in the case of poultry and fish as with beef and mutton. Carcases of sheep, or sides of beef, may be cured whole or in the most minute portions. "We have been favored with the perusal of private letters, received a short time since by a large firm in Melbourne from their London correspondents, and the results there given of some of the trials which have been made are certainly of the most surprising character. Messrs Medlock and appear to have been carrying on their experiments for some time, and the correspondent to whom we refer, says that in March last he tasted mutton and poultry which had been treated in this manner on the sth of January, 1867, or fifteen months previously, and he declares both to have been " as sweet as a nut, and the flesh as soft as though just killed." Four sheep were killed under the direction of the Society of Arts, the flesh was preserved with the bi-sulphite and tried at different times, and at every trial the meat proved excellent. Some meat treated in this way has been taken to Constantinople in the heat of summer, and brought back to London, and then found as fresh as ever. Indeed, every possible trial appears to have been made, and all have turned out eminently satisfactory. In the paper read by Mr Scott before the Society of Arta, which we have before quoted from, that gentlemaa, allnding to this new discovery, says : — " In this preparation I believe we have the means of converting to our use the enormous meat stores of Australia and South America, and I look forward with confidence to seeing beef and mutton imported for sale at from 2|d to 3d per lb, of a quality equal to any we can now procure." Not one of the least of the changes which will be effected by this new discovery will be in the victualling of ships. It will not be necessary to carry live stock on the one hand, nor on the other will the poorer class of passengers and the crew be almost entirely confined to salted provisions. -Fresh meat may be secured during the entire voyage, no matter how long it may be, at far less expense than is incurred under the present system. The Messageries Imperiales nave already ordered a quantity of meat prepared in this manner to be shipped monthly to Marseilles, for the use of their India and China service. The preservation of meat by the bisulphite of lime has two advantages. The first is the ease, celerity, and economy, with which the operation itself is performed. The second lies in the fact that, when cooked, the meat eats perfectly fresh, and it would be impossible to say that it had not just been procured from the butcher's. The only preparation required before cooking is soaking the joint for a short time in cold water. All hat the bisulphite really does is to airest decomposition, and when relieved by soaking from tbe coating which has been placed around it, the meat is again in its original fresh condition, and after being cooked, there is not the slightest flavor of the chemical agent by means of which it has . been preserved. The importance of this discovery to the meat-growers of Australia can Bcarcely be overrated. It offers to them an easy mode" of placing their surplus stock in the best markets under the most favorable

circumstances. It has already been tried here, though only to a limited extent, but the trials have all confirmed the reports previously received concerning it. There is little doubt that it will soon be tested on a far larger scale ; and if the anticipations formed respecting it are verified, the boiling-down establishments will give placa to others, which will be of far greater importance, both socially and economically.