Chapter II: The Possibilities of Agriculture

told about the British agriculturists becoming “meat-makers” instead of “wheat-growers,” no corresponding increase of live stock took place during the last twenty-five years. Far from devoting the land freed from cereals to “meat-making,” the country further reduced its live stock in 1885–1895, and began to show a slight increase during the last few years only. It had 6,597,964 head of horned cattle in 1885, 6,354,336 in 1895, and 7,057,520 in 1909–1911; 26,534,600 sheep in 1885, 25,792,200 in 1895, and from 26,500,000 to 27,610,000 in 1909–1911. True, the number of horses increased; every butcher and greengrocer runs now a horse “to take orders at the gents’ doors” (in Sweden and Switzerland, by the way, they do it by telephone). But if we take the numbers of horses used in agriculture, unbroken, and kept for breeding, we find only small oscillations between 1,408,790 in 1885 and 1,553,000 in 1909. But numbers of horses are imported, as also the oats and a considerable amount of the hay that is required for feeding them.³⁸ And if the consumption of meat has really increased