Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1892-02-04

process of Transforming the vegetable To
TEN, fats and carbohydrates Of grass and
grain into the animal protein and fat of
beef, pork and mutton. The same principle
applies in the production of milk, eggs and
other animal foods. In the most economical
feeding of animals it takes number of
poands OF hay or corn to make pound of
beef or pork In other words, let the
farmer make animal protein and fat from
vegetable materials in the best way he can,
and stiIl he must consume large quantity
of soil product to produce small amount
of animal food. Hence animal foods are
costIier than vegetable. This is the simple
explanation of the fact that in most parts
of the world meat is the food Of only the
well-to-do, while the poor live almost en-
tirely on vegetable food. Thus ordinary
people in Europe eat but little meat, and in
India and China they have none at all. It
is hard enough for them to get the nutri-
ment they need in vegetable forms. Meats
they cannot afford.
But Matchmaking as pursued in the
United States is, as a rule, far more waste
full than it need be, on account of the ex-
cessive fairness impaired to it. We call it
''fat meat, D but really the fat portions are
not meat at all, but simply fat. The ex-
cessive fat is something not wanted by the
consumer; hence to great extent it is so
much waste. But this way we have of
making our meats excessively fat comes
about very naturally. In most corn regions
of our country there is great surplus
capable of producing atentirely more than
of producing flesh. This the farmer
must use, so he lays the fat
on his animals and sells them
as fat meat The farmer must
do this to save himself. If there
never had been in this country certain
regions capable of producing little else than
corn there never would have been any very
excessively fat meat. Making excessively
fat meat is merely way those corn-raisers
have of taxing the public to pay up losses
due to the limited agricultural capabilities
of their location. The pork-producers Of
the corn-growing states select the breeds
of hogs, which, as they say, twill take the
most corn to markell The same may be
said of the beef-prOducers in the corn
states.
1t is easy to see how that kind of thing
is a tax on the consumer. The consumer
doesn't need the fat-if he did he could bay
it cheaper as fat than as meat. Partof the
fat is trimmed out of the meat by the
butcher, part is left on our plates at the
table to go to the soap man or garbage
barrel, while only comparatively small
proportion is eaten. But even this small
proportion is too much so far as relates to
nourishment or resultant good health.
But the days of excessively fat meat are
about numbered, for the people have
learned that it is as easy thing to produce
good meat without extreme fat as with it,
As a consequence they will not buy both
fat and meat when they want only meat,
and as further consequence meat manu-
featuring must drift away from the corn
states to such states as can sustain extern
sive pasturage, and can raise cheaply va
riety of 1esh-forming feeds.
OF course one can readily see where this
lets Texas in. If Texas does not speedily
become the great meat-producing section of
this whole country it will certainly not be
for lack of natural capabilities.