Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 June 1893 — ANIMAL CENSUSES. [ARTICLE]

ANIMAL CENSUSES.

A. Fhase of the Population Question but Seldom Considered. We are accustomed to take into consideration the population of a country or town in thinking or speaking of it, but we consider this matter from a somewhat restricted—that is, a human—point of view. If we looked at it from an equine point of view, and considered countries and cities as to their horse population, these regions and places would be changed about a great deal in rank and importance. Populous countries would all at once become thinly inhabited, and certain great cities would disappear from the face of the earth. Thus it would be, alto, if we looked at the matter from tbe mule’s or the pig’s or the sheep’s point of view. Certain cities of Eastern Asia, for instance, have no horses at all. The Tuamotu archipelago, which extends in the Pacific Ocean a distance of fifteen hundred miles, is put down in the official publication of the United States Department of Agriculture on the farm animals of the world as possessing only two horses. They must be lonesome animals indeed, unless they are so fortunate as to have the same owner. The most populous horse country in the world is Russia in Europe. It has twenty millions of horses. The United States comes next, with a horse population of more than sixteen millions. In proportion to the number of inhabitants, the United States is far richer in horses than Russia. But in that proportion the United States is in turn far surpassed by the Argentine Republic, where, according to

the latest accessible figures, there are a few more horses than people. The countries of Western and Southern Europe are thinly populated with horses, compare l with the American continent and Russia. Italy, with a human population of more than thirty millions, has only seven hundred and twenty thousand horses. But it has almost twice as many mules and donkeys as horses. Spain has only a few more than three hundred thousand horses, or about one horse to every sixty people. Most of the “cavaliers” of Spain ride on donkeys. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland has only about two million horses.

The United States is th ; most populous mule country in the world. It is also, by many millions, the most populous pig country, possessing over forty-six millions of swine. There is here also a larger proportion of pigs to the human population than in any other country—larger even th in ip Ireland, a country which is popularly but mistakenly supposed to be the Utopia of the pig. The country of the sheep, par excellence, is Australia. On that continent there are a few more than three million people, but there are sixty-two million sheep—that is to say, twenty sheep to every man, woman and child. In the United States we have only about forty-seven million sheep, which, though a larger sheep population than that of any other country except Australia and the Argentine Republic, is not proportionately so great a number as several other countries possess. British India has more cattle than any other country, but the United States has almost as many—upwards of fifty-two millions. However, the Argentine Republic again leads in the number of cattle in proportion to human beings. If the cattle in Argentina were divided equally among all the people, every man, woman and child would have five cattle to take care of, and there would be enough left to give one additional “critter” each to almost a million of the people. Considered from the point of view of farm animals, the Argentine Republic is probably the most important country in the world.