THE INCIDENTAL JOINT.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLVI, Issue 119, 17 May 1912, Page 2

THE INCIDENTAL JOINT.

One of the hoariest jokes ia America is the say ing that the pork-packing establishments of c hitago use every bit of the pig except the squeal. Wide as has been the circulation of this pleasantry about the utilisation of by-products in slaughter houses, mosfc people probably do not realise low numerous and varied thtee uses are.t? o importint have these branches of the packing industry become, lhafc a writer in an American paper tells us how the a-eat itself has become a mero incident. 1 in the bus'nees. When you have dined off a joint you have just " begun to patronise the industry." Toe chair you nit in may be upholstered with hog-bair; the mattress you sleepon may be stuffed with cattle-hair ; the collar.button you lose in the morning is ti the shin bone of a steer, and the handle of your tooth brush is of the thigh. Your soap is another by-product. Tha dynamite you may use in destroying a tree-stump has fora constituent a byproduct of meat-packing. Youc wife combs your hair with a c >mb mude from horn, and ths pipe you smoke may have a stem from the sane ■ material. The packers say that if it were not to: the Dy-pro-ducts meat would bo dearer than it is Swift's, one of the big Chicago firms, to prove this point, shows in its Year Hook exactly what happened to 279 animals bought by the firm from a Texas grower at 4.6 cents a pound, a price that did not satisfy him. The amount ■ paid by Swift's was 15,000 dollars, and the meat sold at about six and a halt' dollars a cwt., fefcchtd 12,860 dollars, leaving a substantial deficit;, "lhere was not a loss, however, on the transaction," cays the Year iJook. " From the oy-pjoducts, tha hides, the hoofs, the horns, etc., the sole source of profit in the industry, . . . 'Was finally realised a profit of 1.26 dollais on each steer—less than one-fifth: of a cent on each pound OH meat." .Doubtless it is hoped that this will be comfort to harassed housewives in the '(states. '■'"". . .'■'..