“A large herd of buffaloes became intermingled with our cattle.”
The cattle dealers are not, as might at first appear, regardless of the sufferings of their stock. To them the loss in weight is a loss in money, and for selfish reasons, if for no other, they would be interested in any plan for keeping the animals in good condition. Many devices and inventions have been tried to lessen suffering and save flesh, all of which have been found objectionable. One of these inventions was a “palace cattle car,” which was introduced a few years ago. It was a car divided into stalls, so as to allow each animal a separate apartment. There was room to lie down, and food and drink were supplied to every stall, so that there was no need to take the cattle from the cars during the entire journey. But for some reason the cars did not work well. The speculators and butchers objected on the ground that with so few cattle in a car the cost of getting them to market was too great; and those who had welcomed them because they promised to relieve suffering, acknowledged that the steer, placed singly in a stall, was bruised more by being thrown against the partition walls than when he was jammed in between two of his fellow prisoners in the old cars. So the “palace cars” were withdrawn, and the old system of slow torture—twenty-four to thirty-six hours of fasting and jolting followed by a day of feasting and rest—went on. But thoughtful and humane men have for years been studying the question of live stock transportation, and some day not long distant means will be found to lessen the sufferings of the steer in his railroad trip to New York. Even no less a personage than a United States Senator has devoted many years to this subject, and I am not sure but more real fame will attach to the name of the Hon. John B. McPherson of New Jersey for a recent invention to relieve suffering cattle than he will earn in the Senate Chamber; at any rate he is entitled to everlasting gratitude from all the sons and daughters of Bos.
The invention to which I refer is a simple arrangement for feeding and watering stock on the cars, and consists of a trough for water which revolves on a pivot so as to be readily cleaned and inverted when not in use; and a folding rack for hay, which can be shut up out of the way when empty. Experiments with Mr. McPherson’s invention have proved its usefulness, and the Pennsylvania Railroad Company will soon have two hundred cars built with his improvement. With a well-filled rack before him, and fresh water always within reach, the steer will be able to get through the journey with a tolerable degree of comfort, even though he is without a bed to lie upon.
The cattle-yards in our large cities, acres of small, square pens, ranged in long rows, with narrow lanes between, are familiar and not particularly inviting places, and, luckily for the steer, his life there is short. Landed from the cars he is driven into one of the small pens with about thirty others, where he stays for a day or two without experiencing any new incident in his life, except that he is poked and yelled at by any number of beef-buyers who want to learn his condition. Poor fellow! It makes little difference what condition he may be in, for there are a million mouths to feed in the city over there, and three thousand miles across the blue ocean yonder, those pursy Englishmen are calling for “American beef!”
About the second morning after his railroad journey is finished, and our steer is in the Jersey stock pens, a dirty-looking old ferry-boat runs up alongside the wharf. The gates are opened and the cattle go rushing pell-mell on deck, where they find themselves in pens similar to those they have just left. Twenty minutes steaming up and across the Hudson River, and the steamer ties up at the Thirty-fourth Street dock in New York.
Manhattan Market, where the cattle are going, is that large brick building nearly two blocks away from the river. The river-front and the broad avenue between the landing and the market are crowded with piles of freight, and heavily-loaded trucks, and we instinctively wonder how the timid and frightened cattle can ever be driven through such jam and confusion. At many of the landings this work has been attended with the greatest difficulty; accidents have been of frequent occurrence, and many cattle have escaped and rushed madly through the crowded streets, like the hero of our story.
Cattle-yard.
But the cattle dealers have overcome this obstacle just as the railroads conquer the mountains and rocks—by tunneling. As the cattle come from the boat they pass under an archway, and find themselves in an underground passage, a long tunnel dug many feet underneath buildings and streets. The further end of the tunnel opens in the abattoir, or slaughter-house, and the cattle come out face to face with fate in the shape of a hundred butchers, who stand with gleaming knives awaiting their victims. The cattle are driven forward. Overhead, fastened to strong cross-beams, is a windlass, around which a rope is coiled. A stout iron hook hanging from the end of the rope is seized by one of the butchers, who deftly catches it around the hind leg of a steer. The windlass is turned, and in a trice the poor fellow is swinging in mid-air, head downward. A huge tin pan is slipped under his head, and a long knife, keen-edged as a razor, is drawn across his throat. The life-blood gushes out in a dark stream, and in less time than it takes to tell it our steer ceases to exist, and becomes beef.
We shall not have time to watch the process of cutting up and the disposition of all the parts in detail. From the time the steer passes into the hands of the man with the hook until he is hung up two halves of beef occupies eleven minutes, and on a trial of skill between the butchers the work has been done in eight minutes. But this is a small part of the work. The pan of blood has to be taken to the tanks in the adjoining room, where it is dried and made into a fertilizer to enrich the earth; the horns are saved for the comb manufacturer; the large bones in the head are sent to the button factory; the hide to a tannery; the hoofs to the glue and gelatine makers. The tripe man comes around for the stomach; one man buys all the tongues, and another has a contract for all the tails; and so on, until every scrap is disposed of.