The Telegram. — 1895-01-01 (Weymouth, Dorset, England)

THE FARM. THE MERRY MIDDLENIAN.  This has been a merry Christmas for one section of the comiuunity. Whilst farmers are grumbling about low prices, and the unemployed are demonstrating on Tower-hill and elsewhere, the middleman has been " standing on velvet." It would bean interesting inquiry if one could ascertain the amount that this gentleman has levied on Christmas dinners, and even more interesting if one could tell anything like the amount which is taken out of the pockets of the producers and consumers of London in the course of twelve months. Of course, under our present state of society it would he impossible to diTense with the middleman. The machinery of trade is so complicated that the commissariat of 5,000,000 of people, huddled together on 120 square miles of land, is so stupendous, that the work of distribution must always be an enormous one. But the question becomes every day of increasing importance as to whether the cost of the present mode of distribution is at all commensurate with the work done. Consittering the value of money, food is not cheap at the present day. Where, then, does the differencs.go to  Take the caSe of bread. Wheat at the present time is selling at a lower price thaiyat any time during the past 200 years. Yet how much agyantage does the suburban householder get in his bread bill I A quarter of wheat will make 27 stones of flour. The cost of converting this quarter of wheat into flour is pretty well covererl by the bye-products, such as bran, sharps, &c. The Present price of flour is now about 20s per sack of 20 stones. Taking the price of wheat at 22s per quarter, here is a profit of 5s per sack over and above the byeproducts. A sack of flour will make 92 quartern loaves. The price of the quartern loaf still remains generally at 6,1, hut taking it at fid, a sack of flour as bread brings in 38s 4d, a gross profit of 18s 4d per sack for the baker. Then, again, the Christmas beef has bad to pay a heavy toll to the butcher. Turning to our market reports we read that "there was virtually no demand." The price of English beef is there quoted at from Ss 8d to 3s 104 per stone—under 64 per lb. Last Monday week at the Metropolitan cattle market the very primeat Scotch oxen were selling at 4s per stone, and yet the demand was so small that many were turned out unsold. But a good many people eat English meat— English only from the fact that it is sold in England. It has been reared and fattened on Canadian farms, or upon the ranches of Wyoming or Texas. The best forequarters of refrigerated beef have been selling for 2s per atone of 81b, or 31 per lb. Now the weight of a forequarter is, say, about 14 stones. Supposing one-half of this to be rough meat, that leaves seven stones at 45 per stone, or 61 per lb. Yet how many people have got their roasting pieces at anything like this price in the suburban shops I Then it should be remembered that seven stoups of rough meat are worth something; in fact, there is a standing price for what are known in :she market as " thnbers," or shins of beef, of about 2-A per pound. These are bought for the manufacture of extracts of meat which are upon the market. Our readers will now begin to have some idea of the profit of the butchers when markets are glutted, as they arc at prement. Of course, it must not be assuniA that they sell nothing hut refrigeraten beef, but there is reason to believe that they do sell a good deal, and do not always tell the customer what he is buying. This is still more the came when we conic to consider our supplies of mutton. Whenever a purchaser sees a nice little saddle or leg of mutton, of small weight and not fat, nicely floured over and tied up with ribbons, lie may shrewdly suspect that, although it is labelled " prime Scotch" or " prime Welsh," the sheep from which it was taken was bred and fed in New Z 'eland or on the banks of the River Plate, and brought over in the ice-house of a big ocean-goitig steamer, and sold in the Metropolitan !tfeat Market at about 3d per pound. This may he interesting to those people who have given Is a pound for a "Scotch" or " Welsh" saddle or leg of mutton. In fact, so openly is this done that some butchers actually give themselves away in their own shops. Customers may sometimes have noticed sheeps' kidneys offered for sale at 64 per plate of four; it may be interesting for them to know that the standard pnce for English sheeps' kidneys is 3s per dozen wholesale. The kidneys that are offered for lid each come out of the refrigerated sheep, and are sold wholesale in the markets at um per dozen, and very nice they are. They can be purchased retail in the city markets at ld apiece. It is wonderful that people do not take greater advantage of these markets. Of course, it may be very convenient, when one wants a leg of mutton, to do as Dora Cupperfield did—tell the butcher to send one in ; but this is apt to be a somewhat expensive means of getting one nowadays, whereas a journey to Smithfield will enable one to be purchased at about half the price, which, if properly thawed and cooked, will eat as well as the hest English. --Daily Chronicle.  With his brain thrown off its balance by a bout of chinking, William Wiiiteman on Boxing day shot his wife and his two children at Winooski, in Vermont, and then committed suicide.