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    U immeasurablt within month the would ha...

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    THE PROGRESS OF MEAT REFORM. ;, The Duke...

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    ¦INDIAN PliOVipMNT 1 UjNPS. In our issue...

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    Our Foreign Alliances. The Condition Of ...

    fee doubted that Austria is immeasurably stronger irilier position on the Mjucio and the Po , strategically considered , than she has ever been before . fier preparations are not limited , however , within the boundaries of her own domain . The Archduke ¦ Cliarles-Louis is said to have been commissioned to offer terms to the Papal Government which shall induce it to enter into more intimate political relations than ever with that of Vienna . Sacerdotalism is invited to rely unreservedly upon the bayonets of hereditary absolutism , and to withdraw its confidence in that respect from the less stable and reliable parvenu power that has hitherto played the

    part of its protector . The Pope ' s assent is believed to have been asked to the occupation of Bologna and Ferrara by Austrian troops , under the pretence of necessary precaution against an outbreak . In Germany eftorts are making to draw closer the ties between the Courts of Berlin and Vienna . The new Regent having apparently broken off the too intimate relations hitherto subsisting with the Court of St . Petersburg , is not disinclined , it is said , to a rapprochement with that of Vienna ; and both Cabinets eagerly seek the formation , if possible , of a triple alliance , offensive and defensive , ¦ with England . Will Lord Malmesbury and his colleagues lend themselves to such a scheme ?

    To friendly and intimate relations with the present Government of Prussia , as far as the mutual interests of the two nations are involved , we see no ¦ objection . Prussia is for the first time steadily entering upon a policy of constitutionalism , and it is for our interest in every point of view that she should succeed . If an alliance offensive and defensive between the free states of Northern Europe , including Sweden , Denmark , Holland , Belgium , and the Hanse Towns were proposed , we should heartily rejoice to see it brought to completion by the joint influence of Great Britain and Prussia . But to any entanglement of this country with the despotic concerns of either Austria on the one hand , or

    France on the other , we are and shall ever be opposed . If they chose to go to war between themselves , and if unhappy Italy is to be once more their battle-ground , we have no business to interfere . But considering all that is past , and the hopes we held out to Piedmont in conjunction with France , to induce her to join her arms to ours in the Crimea , it would be impossible for us to enter into any compact with Austria which might bring us into collision with our Sardinian ally . Vye are not advocating a rupture on the part of this country with any Continental power . Generally speaking ,

    we are averse to armed interposition in the affairs of foreign states . Were Louis Napoleon to attempt , like his uncle , territorial aggrandisement beyond the Alps , that would be another matter ; but we have no belief in his making any such attempt . It would be quite sufficient gain for him if , through his aid , Northern Italy were emancipated from the hateful yoke it now endures ; and there can be little question that with a whole population in arms , and a Piedmontese anny supported by a hundred thousand Frenchmen , German domination in Lombardy must in a few months cease to exist . That may or may not be a matter of regret with English courtiers and diplomatists ; but it is . perfectly certain that with njheteen-twenticths of

    the English people it would be matter of unmixed rejoicing . If ever foreign rulers deserved to lose the rich possessions they have long held , the Austrian ^ ¦ deserve the loss of Northern Italy . What tins country has a right to insist upon , and what she would be able peremptorily to enforce , provided she Jceeps aloof from the struggle , is the future indefendence of thq "Milanese from all foreign control . £ the Lombards , when freed , chose to nave a separate government , let them have it . If the people of Venice and Milan wish to be united with their brethren of Genoa and Turin , why should they not be bo P All we have to care for is that France docs not become too strong at the expense of Austria -and the Italians .

    But let us look at the question in another , and , for us , a still more serious point of view . France And Piedmont need no help in dealing with their ¦ German antagonist in Lombardy , and Europe may fairly stand by and see them fight it out . But what corner of Europe can hope to be exempt from universal conflagration if England be enticed to meddle in the fray . Docs any one of ordinary information or intelligence believe that Russia could or would resist such an opportunity as would theft be afforded her to retrieve and revenge her roveraos of 1854 and 1855 P Let British dip lomatists sign a treaty of offensive and defensive alliance with Austria , and

    within a month the Czar would have become a party to a similar compact with Victor Emmanuel and Napoleon IIL We should thus be drawn into that greatest of all national calamities—a war with France . We should at the same time be eugaged once more in hostilities with Russia . All the sacrifices we made so short a time ago to repel Muscovite aggression on the Danube would thereby be rendered vain . No military aid that we could render Austria in her efforts to keep or regain possession of Lombardy could appreciably retard the course of events there . ^ Ve should have quite

    enough to do in the Black Sea and the Baltic without sending expeditions against Spezzia or Toulon . Instead of being engaged on the side of national right and freedom , we should be embarked ou the siae of all that is most repugnant to our national interests arid our national pride . We should be involved , as our fathers were by the Tory Ministers of George III ., in a crusade against progress , a . in a sanguinary plot for the confirmation of priestly aud absolutist power . Whatever difficulties there may be in maintaining a dignified neutrality in the fatal Italiau complications , it is manifestly the duty of our Government to do so .

    U Immeasurablt Within Month The Would Ha...

    1354 . . ' ; THE LEADEE . [ No . 4 . 55 , Decejvibeh U 18 * q

    The Progress Of Meat Reform. ;, The Duke...

    THE PROGRESS OF MEAT REFORM . ; , The Duke of Richmond remarked that we no lon <* er see the masses . of fat that encumbered the Smithfield Cattle Show , while the visitors to the exhibition are struck this year with the slight ness of the change from the period of maximum fatness . The prize cattle this year are unquestionably less astounding in the magnitude of their fat ; and , with great skill in handling :, something like completeness in the ventilation , and their certainly improved proportions , so far at least as the fat is concerned , they display far less " distress" than they have done

    in . previous years . Some of them arc comparatively lively . The pigs repose in motionless placidity . Though still alive and breathing , they are little more than the pork of the future , onl y with a differenceit is the pork who is still conscious of the p leasures of the table , whereas hereafter be will himself be the -subject matter of such consciousness .. Some of the best beasts have been sold oiV , the majority remain for the prize market of Monday next ; they will be exhibited next week in butchers' shops , dulyticketed- ; and crowds will hang round the windows to gaze upon the vast dimensions of the joints and the huce proportion of the fat . The initiated

    butchermay tell them , perchance , that the proportions are not so disproportionate as they used- to be ; that there is more symmetry in the joints ; that the line of beauty has been restored to the leg or shoulder . But the public will look on with a sceptical eye , doubting whether the rich tinge of the -fat is precisely tue perfection , cither for the pleasures or wholesomencss of the table . For the public has discovered by this time , that , after all , the ox which gets the prize is not the niocst in the eating ; and they have been told , on excellent authority ., that it is by no means conducive to health—that , in fact , a

    prize ox is a model of unhealthy meat . It is not so tough , not so insipid as the lean beast that the French peasant can scarcely spur to market , bul , perhaps , it is even less suitable for human food . And it is a disagreeable fact that the prize ox of the present season was removed from I no show soon after he had obtained his prize , because ho was discovered to be labouring under contagious disease . The public and the agriculturalist stand in totally opposite relations on the subject , and ou each side the view is perhaps as natural as it could be . To the public , the proof of the beef is in the eating ; but the agriculturalist docs not look quite so far as the table ; his prospect terminates at n shorter

    stage . The vista from his field oxtends only to the market ; the object is , with him , to rear a beast for exhibition in the open pluco of some country town , or in Smithfiold , or perhaps simply to rear him for the salesman , who mediates between the field and the market . Now customs , in all relations of life , grow up slowly , and after they have been once established they bcoomo mannerisms , It is so as much in tho art of agriculture as in painting . In tho good old times , when comparatively little art was used , when a boast was well fed , and kept , and fattoned well , you might be tolerably sure ho was good meat . The butcher looked at his points and felt his sides , and if ho was of tho standard form , with a sufficiency of fat , ho purchased the beast , tolerably sure that ho would out up well into tho regulated joints . By

    degrees , shape and fat grew to be the sole TOh £ ot consideration , especially > vith the fanner and the middleman , who have but faint ideasof tS butcher ' s stall , and far less of the table Oilr considerations intervened Gentlemen began I breed beasts , aud to feed . them , iu moro ° ^ i ° snle style , H was a great object to bt £ them to market . 111 a certain states ' of fatness a ? the market price , llcnee great im . uiry to r ' j / c cover that kind of food which would produce X largest amount of fatness . How bcuclicial if fh .

    ; . could be done in a shorter . time ; for theuthcre , ™ so much the greater profit on the capital The feeding for prompt-fatness became "thefashion . " 1 lie excellence ot the food wits shown in the celerity with which the fat developed itself ; and thus ft was that fatness became the sole standard . Smithfield groaned under a deadweight of uneatable tallow , and the prize ox became the butt of Hood the humanist-satirist . '

    At last , even the . agriculturalist became aivare of his enormity , and lie corrected it . The beasts exhibited at the liakcr-btrcet Bazaar this year arc really so much more ariistical iu form , and so much diminished in mere magnitude- of obesity , that the agriculturalist , judging from the old ' standard measure , is naturally struck with the greatness of the Change . Ou the other hand , well knowing what good meat is , accustomed to look upon p i ^ s , sheep , and cattle from a mere average , and perhaps more art iistieal , point of view , the public is struck with the-fact that the prize ox or the prize wether is for more like his old prize prototype of the Sinithfield show thuii his real tvpe in liaiure . The wether ,

    lor example , is much inure like the panting , pampered manufacture of jViS , than be is like the wild . horned animal that Hies up the steeps of the Scottish mountains almost like . a . bird . Ami when you bring the two to table , the resemblance to the old- tame victim is still greater , with proportionate want of sipidity and wliolesomencss for the epicure Prize meat is . still . not llie best meat . We cannot , however , expect reform in a hurry . It was after the Cattle Show last \ car that Mr . Frederick James G ; uit published bis excellent and concise volume on the viscera of various hVastscxliibited at that . show . Here we have an anatomical

    account of those viscera , wii-h coloured lit ho £ r : i />/ ue drawings , showing "the healthy heart-of a slice ]) , " " diseased heart ot a sheep bv conversion to h \ , Ine Duke of Richmond , KG ., e ' xhibitor and breeder ;" "diseased lungs of a sheep , Lord Ue . rne . rs , exhibitor and breeder ; " " mutton chop , the Duke of Richmond , K . G ., exhibitor and breeder ; " healthy heart of heifer — diseased heart of heifer by conversion to fat , U . K . H . tic Piince Consort exhibitor and breeder ; tJic diseased heard of an ox by conversion to iat .

    lid ward Wortlcy , Kmj ., exhibitor mid breeder . There are also drawings whieh sihow libres ot tlic moat degenerated into fatty cells , various worms taken from fatly substances in the lungs Arc Perhaps nothing presents the . con ) rust more powerfully than the two heifer * ' hearts . One is a ml , rounded cone , with tho point downwards , eovcrcji above by fatty portions in compact , iinnly-uutlHica . and symmetrical masses , tho body of the viscus o the natural deep red . The diseased hear I lin grown broad , its point i . s blunted , the iat uu ™ Has spread to be broader than the viscus Use 11 , ou is haw . shapeless , mid yellow ; the hciirt a dmi , jc iutu

    pulo , unnatural colour—u kind of dun hruwn . «« machine is evident ly calculated to receive the heiUW blood engendered , by healthy digestive orguib , ™ aerated by healthy lungs , aud to propel it ou healthy art cries ; the other , a dead reeep I M « languid blood , which it can scarcely con ac pump through the channela oMilo . s mul m 'io channels , under a languid vegetative » P »' 1 ' blood is half converted into ni-c-oi . s . t rucu-d HM . and the blood itself corrupting bclore " - "<* ' Q tho meat intended for our table . ll » or « ' « w power , last your of judging ll »« - ^ l » ow l > y the- ^ , ^ J which Mr . Gunt has intituled : tins ^"" Vmblic , of agriculturalist * , as well na of the uitcrcslc uJM have boon further opened ; and nest your , w ^ tho volume will bo still more nrolitablc m elucidations .

    ¦Indian Pliovipmnt 1 Ujnps. In Our Issue...

    ¦ INDIAN PliOVipMNT 1 UjNPS . In our issue of Ilio 87 th ultimo wo « J « oJJJ ^ lion to tho manner in which the Kvoal i » < ion 3 bollion hud unacted those lVovideuU' » " ¦• which have a commercial bearing , > " "f g » t 8 iu iuioo Companies ; but there arc oUor mtw «»*

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 11, 1858, page 18, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_11121858/page/18/