Butter which they furnish to the London market. Epping and Cambridge butters, once so famous, are known no more, and even Devonshire and Dorset are far less important as sources of supply than Normandy and Denmark. As regards the United Kingdom as a whole, the foreign butter consumed now outweighs the home production probably by two to one; but in London the proportions are still more striking. A large butter dealer estimates that 95 per cent. of the butter consumed in London is of foreign origin.

6

Normandy has a very large market for butter in London, where it is known commercially as 'Brittany butter'; and a large quantity of Danish butter comes over, chiefly in the winter months. The great advantage of these foreign butters over their English rivals is their uniformity of quality. This is secured in Denmark by the system of huge co-operative' dairies, to which the neighbouring farmers send their milk. In Normandy the factor buys the butter ready made from the dairymen twice or thrice a week, after which it is roughly sorted, and the best qualities are ground up together in a butter mill into one uniform article. The large butter dealers complain that English and Irish dairymen do not take trouble to make butter uniform in quality, colour, and saltness, so that, with the increasing concentration of the London trade in the hands of large dealers the home produce has practically been beaten out of the field. It remains to be seen how far the co-operative dairies which are springing up in various parts of Ireland will succeed in removing the reproach which formerly attached to Irish butter.

But, as hinted above, the causes which have curtailed the supply of butter from the home and midland counties to London are too deep-seated to be wholly removed by any improvement in the quality of the article or even by any

scheme of wholesale butter factories. The itinerant butterschools sent round the rural districts under the auspices of the Technical Education Committees of the various County Councils have probably more effect on the quality of the butter consumed locally than on the food supply of London and the large towns. The fact is that the operations of supplying milk and butter to London are, to a large extent, mutually exclusive industries, and that, for districts within a certain radius from London and within reasonable distance of a railway, it is, at present, more profitable to send fresh milk than butter. Such home-made butter as is consumed in London comes chiefly from districts outside that radius-e.g. Devonshire or Ireland; and Normandy commands as easy access to the London market as either of these districts.

The introduction of so-called 'Brittany' butter to London furnishes an interesting case of the indirect economic results of political events. Formerly Paris was the great market for the butter of north-west France. But in 1870-71 the German armies separated the capital from the farmers of Normandy and Brittany, and the eyes of the latter were therefore turned elsewhere. Shipment after shipment was sent to London, at first with no favourable results, although the butter was offered wholesale at 1s. 1d. per lb., while 2s. was the retail price of the best English butter. At last it came under the notice of Mr. Hudson, now known as the 'butter king,' who tasted it and bought up all the French butter in the market. Had it not been for the accidental dislocation of industry by the FrancoGerman war, Normandy butter might have had to wait some time longer for its opportunity to invade the English market, but the economic advantages on its side would have brought it to our doors sooner or later. At present three-quarters of the Brittany butter which comes to London is said to be exported by two large French firms. But, with the perfecting of arrangements for cold storage in transit, other countries more distant than Normandy and Denmark, or even than Sweden and Finland, have begun to contribute to the London butter supply. In winter a quantity of frozen Australian butter comes over, especially about Christmas, and much of it is kept in cold stores at the docks or at the private stores of large dealers, to be distributed daily to customers as required. If, as is estimated, half the Australian butter imported is consumed in London and the neighbourhood, the contribution of Australia to the London butter supply last year was nearly 6000 tons. Canada and the United States also send some butter to the London market, and during the last three or four years a considerable and promising trade has sprung up with the Argentine Republic.

As to the average consumption of butter per head we are dependent upon estimates, for there are no direct statistics of butter production. Following, however, the usual calculations of the average amount of milk produced from a milch cow, we find that the home production of milk in the United Kingdom averages about 37 gallons per head of population, which, after deducting 15 gallons for the milk consumption, leaves 22 gallons for the home production of butter and cheese. For the division of this milk between butter and cheese we are dependent on the conjectures of experts, and these are well summarised in Mr. Rew's paper to which reference has already been made. On the whole we shall probably not be far wrong in assuming that of the milk used in making butter and cheese about

16 gallons per head go to make butter and 6 to make cheese. If this be so, about 6 lb. of butter per head of the population are produced annually in the United Kingdom, which, added to imports of 8 lb. per head, gives a total consumption of, say, 15 lb. per head, exclusive of butter substitutes. Whether the butter consumption of London is above or below this average it is difficult to say, though London certainly surpasses the country in the use of margarine. In the Family Budgets' published by the Economic Club the weekly expenditure on butter of eight families in London, comprising thirty-eight individuals, amounted to 11s. 64d., representing a consumption of, say, 10 lb. weekly, or an annual consumption per head of 14 lb.

It is notorious that butter substitutes, under the name of 'Margarine,' form an increasing element in popular consumption, especially in poorer districts. How far they find a genuine market under their own name, and how far they are fraudulently sold in place of butter, are at present matters of keen controversy. The Food and Drugs Amendment Act of 1899 is intended to discriminate between the so-called legitimate and illegitimate uses of margarine. It provides additional machinery for the detection and punishment of adulteration, requires all margarine to be conspicuously labelled as such, and absolutely prohibits the sale of any mixture of butter and margarine containing more than 10 per cent. of butter, on the ground that these mixtures are difficult to detect by analysis. Attempts were made without success to induce the Government to forbid the colouring of margarine to imitate butter. It seems, however, that the consumer would not stand white, red, or blue margarine. He likes to know what he is buying, but perhaps he also likes the imitation to have sufficient resemblance to the real article to deceive his friends if not himself.

The bulk of margarine consumed in this country is imported from abroad, chiefly from Holland, which in its turn derives the raw material or half-finished product from America, to be mixed with a certain percentage of Danish butter and exported as 'butterine.' A considerable amount of margarine consumed in London is, however, made close at hand. There are six factories registered under the Margarine Act of 1887 at work in or near London, and of these a single great margarine factory in the suburbs is said to turn out between one and two hundred tons weekly, most of which finds its way to the East-end and the suburbs of London. The chief raw material -animal fat-is obtained largely from Deptford, but a considerable amount of milk is drawn daily from the surrounding

districts to be used in the manufacture. The price of margarine varies from 4d. to 10d. per pound, according to the proportion of butter-fat contained, and it is claimed by the manufacturers that the best compares favourably with all but the best butter as regards flavour and wholesomeness.

Taking the United Kingdom altogether, we find that about 2.5 lb. per head of margarine is annually imported for home consumption, compared with 3.8 lb. so lately as 1892. The decline is almost certainly to be associated with the establishment of margarine factories in the United Kingdom, of which two alone (belonging to the same company) have an annual output of nearly 1 lb. per head of the whole population. Thus we may safely assume that, whether they know it or not, the people of this country consume not less than 4 lb. per head of margarine per annum. The London consumption is, no doubt, chiefly derived from home sources. It would be an interesting, if unexpected, result of the 'Diseases of Animals Act' if the slaughtering of huge numbers of foreign cattle on arrival in the Thames and Mersey were to have the indirect effect of building up the margarine industry, which depends on large supplies of cheap animal fat.

From butter and its substitutes it is an easy step to Cheese. The cheapening of meat to the consumer has probably somewhat contracted the demand for the commoner kinds of cheese, and the increase in the importation of foreign and Canadian cheese may have been more than counterbalanced by the decline in home production. This decline is partly attributable to the same causes which have curtailed the home production of butter, viz., the opening up of more profitable uses for milk in the direct supply of the large towns. If we may rely on the conjecture made above, as to the relative amounts of home-produced milk used in butter and cheese production respectively, about 6 gallons of milk per head of the population are annually turned into cheese, yielding 6 lb. of home-made cheese per head, which, added to 6 lb. of imported cheese, gives a total annual consumption of 12 lb. per head. Canada is by far the most important source of our foreign cheese supply, accounting last year for nearly two thirds of the total quantity imported. The United States came next with about one fifth, followed by Holland, Belgium, New Zealand, and France.

In recent years London has become dependent on sources outside the United Kingdom for a large and increasing proportion of its supply of Eggs. In 1898, 3,220,000 'great hundreds of eggs were imported into London. The 'great

hundred,' a curious old-fashioned unit which still prevails in the trade, is equivalent to 120, so that the above annual importation amounts to over 80 eggs per head of the London population. We cannot directly compare this figure with the imports of eggs into London in 1853; but, for the United Kingdom as a whole, we find that the imports last year were over 14,000,000 'great hundreds' (or 45 eggs per head), compared with about 1,000,000 (or 5 eggs per head) in 1853, when eggs were still subject to a small import duty. The trade accounts show that the great majority of imported eggs come from European countries-chiefly Russia, Germany, Belgium, France, and Denmark, but a considerable and growing quantity now crosses the Atlantic from Canada. In 1853 almost the whole of the imports came from France, but Russia has now taken the lead and is increasing it year by year.

It is a matter of common knowledge that the average consumption of Sugar has risen largely in recent years. The fall in price and the removal of duties, to which this increase of consumption is largely due, have caused sugar to be utilised largely as a raw material in various manufactures as well as directly as an article of diet. The use of sugar as a substitute for malt in brewing will be noted below. Another large and growing industry into which sugar enters is the manufacture of jams, biscuits, and confectionery. It was estimated ten years ago that 34,000 tons of sugar were used by seven leading firms in London in these industries alone; and the quantity so employed has doubtless largely increased since that date.

London has, of course, always been dependent on the over-sea colonies or foreign countries for its sugar supply, but formerly a large proportion of the sugar arrived in a raw state from tropical countries, and was refined in the capital, chiefly in the East-end. In recent years, however, through the application of chemical science and the fostering influence of foreign bounties, beetroot grown on the European continent has become a formidable competitor of the sugar-cane; and at the present time beetroot at least equals cane as an element in the total sugar production of the world, and far exceeds it in importance as a source of supply for London and the United Kingdom generally. Twenty-five years ago the imports of sugar into this country were divided between cane and beet in the proportion of three to one. Ten years ago the proportions derived from the two sources of supply were roughly equal; last year they were as one to five. Such cane sugar as still arrives in this country comes mainly to Liverpool, so that practically it may be stated that the whole of the sugar