Wholesale Slaughter.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 2608, 30 March 1889, Page 2 (Supplement)

Wholesale Slaughter.

Being of a party of gentlemen shown by the proprietors through the givit. slaughterhouse of Swift and Co., Chicago, 1 subjoin soras notes that answer inquiriemost frequently made by those who hnvp never been tl :—Neatness goes hnnd in hand with every operation all over the building, aud the consumer of Chicago meat products eats as little dirt an if thn animals were killed in a thousand widely scattered houses; 2300 hands are employed, and 21 uniformed men with full police powers watch the immense concern night and day. Sheep to be killed are placed on the left side on a bench. The butcher, standing at the back, grasps the nose iu hi" left, hand, turns the head bnck a little, and with the right hand thrusts a sharp-pointed kuifo between the vertebra} and the veins, cutting out at the throat, nearly severing tho head. The knife is then laid down; the right hand placed back of the neck and tho head turned buck, breaking the neck. The only evidence of suffering shown by the sheep is two or three quick kicks when the neck is broken. The whole operation takes from 15 to 20 seconds.

Hogs are driven into a close pen about 12 feet deep, where a muscular, touch looking negro attaches a chain by a grabhook to ono hind leg. The hog is instantly hoisted to tho top of the pen n,nd swung outside, where, on a raised platform, he is met by the striker, who inserts a knife in his throat, cutting one vein by the thrust, and turning the knife cuts the other as the knife is withdrawn. The operation of sticking is to deftly performed that it can almost be ranked with sleight-of-hand tricks. The time consumed does not take more than five seconds, and the time from the instant the grab-chain lifts the porker from hin feet, until his life blood isgushing , out is about 40 seconds. The strain on the heavy hog's hind lour is excessive, and probablv the suffering is greater from thin source than from the almost instantaneous sticking. The cases for sausages are cleaned by running between two slats oneeight of an inch apart, and then turning a stream of water under pressure through them until they aro thoroughly ecoured out.

The oattle aro slaughtered without any suffering other than the terror oausfd by the smell of blond and the rudemj*" of the rough gamins who help to drive thorn to the pens. From tho larger pens they aro let into small boxes boldiug three or four. Just over their heads is a plank, on which stands an active young fellow with an egg-shaped sledge of Gib or 81b. He watches his chance, never gettiug excited or in a hurry, and its a steer turns his head up to tho daylight above, he hits him a tap with the sledge that drops him. Instantly a sliding door rises, a grab-hook in attached to one fore leg, and the steer is dragged on to tho slaughter-house floor, where another man with a sledge hits him twice in the forehead while the chain is being , shifted to the hind losr. Instantly the steer is hoisted into the air, and after hanging about a minute is bled by a knifo thrust in the throat. The blood follows the knife in a stream as largo as a man's wrist, and the carcase is emptied of blood in less than half a minute. From what I saw I judge that the theory of country butchers that a hoef animal can bo killed too dead to bleed well is erroneous, as special pains «ro taken to havo tho an.;taa,l dead before stioking.—L. B, PiEMCB.