PRODUCTION AND CONSUMPTION OF WOOL.

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 14029, 28 April 1911, Page 6

PRODUCTION AND CONSUMPTION OF WOOL.

Now that the clip of 1910 has practically all gone forward to the world's market stock may he taken regarding the supply and demand. From Messrs H. Sclnvartze and Co.'s annual estimate of tho production and consumption of wool wo learn that the total quantity of the raw material available for consumption in 1910 was 2,546 million pounds, against 2,592 million and 2,295 million pounds "in 1909 and 1908 respectively. As in the years before, the imports were influenced by the shifting of arrivals, and the new wools received from Australasia and the Capo by the end of December were smaller, and those from the River Plate were larger, than at the end of 1909. Tho receipts from the colonies and the River Plate in Europe and North America during tho calendar year j amounted to 2,403,000 bales Australasian, 301,000 bales Cape, and 471,000 bales River Plate, against 2,351,000, 400,000 and 535,000 bales respectively in 1909. The conspicuous feature was the great decrease from the River Plate, which, for the season, was even larger than for the previous season —namely, 110,000 bales of large size. The supply of other sorts showed a decrease of Mediterranean, East India, and China wools, as compared with the hut;e | figures of a year ago, but there was some increase in West Coast produce nnd Patagonian wool and mohair. The firm state that a comparison of the number of sheep at various times and ii. relation to population, as given by some statisticians, is somewhat misleading, as far as the production of wool is concerned. For instance, Australasia possessed last year about the same number of. sheep as in 1891, but the production has grown by about 50 per cent., and not only in tho number of bales, which may now be somewhat different in condition and size, but in the estimate of the quantity of clean wool produced, namely, 440 3gainst 290 million pounds in 1891. It is a wellknown fact that the average shearing weight per sheep, owing to improvements, and particularly to crossing, has largely increased in Australasia and the River Plate, and also in other places. This is an important point that one is apt to overlook unless the wool production is taken into consideration along with the sheep statistics. The quantity of clean wool at the disposal of the industry (not the quantity actually consumed in the form of

•.nnuufactureV) increased on the average of periods per head of population from 1871 to 1900 by 0 and 7J, per cent., but in the period from 1001 to UUO it decreased by -I per cent., as compared with the previous ten years. Tallin;:, however, the last fire years separately the amount is 2.70 lbs per head against 2.Gilbs per head from 1901 to IS-'CTi. La >t year's contribution shows a largo ialling-off in North America b;>t a considerable increase in tiie quantity left for consumption in tiie United States, and a further moderate increase on the Continent. The present season'"; supply is admittedly not like!.* to .show any material difference, as the increase from Australia and the Rir»>r Plate will hardly be so important as was at first expected. No increase, but a probable decrease is expected from New Zealand and the Cape. It is hardly possible that the iticreased yield of woo! noted by Messrs H. Sehwartzo and Co. to have taken place during the last twenty years i 3 going to bo improved upon at anything like the same rate, therefore the quantity of wool available in the future will hear a closer relation to the number of sheep than it has done during the period mentioned. The prospect of increasing the sheep stocks of the world does not appear to warrant the assumption th.it the supply of wool will overtake the increase of the wool consuming population. Australia is now well stocked with sheep, and close to the danger limit in view of a change and dry season; New Zealand will possibly show a small but steady increase for some years to come with the breaking in of new country, especially in the North Island (though counteracted somewhat by the increase in dairying in the older settled parts), but there is still room for further expansion in the sheep raising industry in South America. On the whole, therefore, the outlook for the wool grower is exceedingly satisfactory.

It is very much to be regretted that owing to tho reciprocity fight in Canada, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, it is feared, will be unablo to attend the Imperial Conference. This means that the gathering will be shorn of its most brilliant orator and its most picturesque figure. Only those who have been in Canada fully realise what a hold Sir Wilfrid has upon tjie hearts of the Canadian people. Even thoso most opposed to him in politics admire him for his talents and his integrity, and one might almost go as far as to say that they one and all love him for his tenderness of heart- and human sympathy. He is particularly a friend of little children, and of all wlio aro in suffering arid distress. With vast opportunities for becoming rich, he is today a poor man. Tho house he lives in in Ottawa was given to him by his admirers. Sir Wilfrid has almost attained his three-score years and ten, a man of frail physique, who probably would have broken down long ere now but for the simple life he leads. In the natural order of things, he cannot long continue to hold such an arduous position as Prime Minister of the Dominion. When ho leaves the political stago, Canada, who has had many great men, wiJJ have lost one of the noblest figures in her gallery of statesmen. From an Imperial point of view, it will be a great loss if he is not able to speak for Canada, in a con- j ferenco which pron isos to be epochmaking. Sir Joseph Ward, not being I overshadowed by his presence, will, however, have a much better opportunity of catching the public eyo and getting n hearing for his Imperial Council proposals.

Tho recent municipal elections provided rather more than the average number ot humorous incidents. It was lunny, at the declaration of the poll, to hear a defeated : Socialist declare that the ''fellows'' who had howled down Messrs Sorenson,. Morris, and Dougall, had been "paid by capital." It was even funnier to hear the Mayorelect—of all persons!—accuse this journal of trying to create a class-feeling. But the runniest incident of the whole campaign was the horror expressed in certain quarters at the activity—nay, even the existeuce—of the Citizens' Association. It was, of course, quite proper for Labour to organise, but it was deplorable that any body of citizens, wiiose ideals were not those of Labour, should take the same course, aa if by combining for the protection of tho ratepayers' interests, the members of tho Citizens' Association were guilty of a crime. There was indeed manifested a pained surprise that Providence should permit stich tactics to be successful. Matters would have gone on so comfortably if only tho Socialist Party had organised and other citizens had been content to maintain a masterly inactivity. The same sort of reproof was dealt out to the Farmers' Union time after time, but the farmers failed unaccountably to realise that though union was good for town work-j ers it was bad form for the men on J the land. And in spite of scolding, the Citizens' Association will no doubt continue to act in the belief that if organisation in municipal politics is a good thing for one section of the community it cannot be bad for another.

Wo remember having seen, a good mauy years ago, a ghastly story of a murderer who. thanks to the skill of a surgeon, was alive and whole after having been decapitated by the guillotine. Real life has not yet achieved this marvel of fiction, but it is creeping up on the imaginative novelists. Already we seem to be within touching I distance of the events in that emesomo | story of Mr Wells's, 'The Island of Doctor Moreau." Parts have actually been transplanted in animals. A dog has walked about quite happily with one leg belonging to another animal, and another has felt no ill effects from a transplanted kidney. Our cables tho other day told us of a doctor successfully putting a bone from a dead man into the body of a live one, and this morning we chronicle an operation by which a woman was given a new gullet in place of one destroyed by sulphuric acid. The transfer of tho bone from a dead human body to a living one is probably the first operation of its kind, but in New Zealand some years ago, a portion of a legbane of a live sheep was successfully grafted on to the diseased arm-bone of a man. When we last heard of this interesting patient, he had an arm like a weight-lifter's. An extraordinary operation was performed the other day

at the East London Hospital, on a child whose skull'had been injured by a fail. The bone had failed to develop on the right side, nnd a soft tumour had formed in its place. When the tumour was removed, a gap of three inches remained to be bridged. A small niece of bone was taken from one jof tho legs and used as a bridge. | Owing to the loss of cerebrospinal t'uid, j the child hung between life and death ;I or a week, but eventually recovered, : the brain Doing nnparentlv undam-Ug'.-ti. Such amazing advances in surgery havo been made of recent years, that j one wonders where the surgeon is going to stop. Operations on the' brain are a comparatively new development. It was not so very long ago that, as Sir Victor Horsley says, it was regarded as fatal to expos? tiie brain: but the work of this brilliant Englishman and other surgeons has made it possible to operate quite successfully on this part. The heart, which most people regard as a delicate organ that, will stop beating if touched, lia.s Oven subjected to astonishing treatment. There are several cases on record where knife wounds in the heart have l>een successfully stitched up. There are men walking about in good health, minus parts of their interior organs that were once regarded as indispensable to ) life. Like most wonderful devolopj ments of civilisation, this marvellous j success of surgery has its danger*;. A tendency may show itself to rely too j much on the knife, and not enough !on natural remedies, to fly to the j surgeon when the physician should In? 1 employed, or a change made in habits |of life. After all, Mr Dooley's ( opinion should always be borne in | mind—as a preventive of blind worship ;of the surgeon—that if doctors opened i more windows and fewer patients j there would be less illness in tho world.