3-038-952 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The last oxen in Paris (sketch by balloon post), 1871. Food shortages during the Franco-Prussian War. 'The last oxen in possession of the Government at Paris available for the daily rations given to the population, at the rate of an ounce per head per diem, were stalled in sheds erected in the Boulevard d'Enfer, against the wall of the Cemetery of Montrouge. The number remaining at the period when our Artist's sketch was taken was extremely small; and it will be seen from our Special Correspondent's diary in Paris, which we have published from week to week, that, so long as three weeks ago, beef had ceased to form a portion of the rations of the Parisians, though it was to be obtained at some of the more expensive restaurants. We understand that, to the very last, such horned cattle as remained in Paris were objects of intense curiosity on the part of the Parisians, who have taken far greater interest in these oxen, of course, than the visitors to our Smithfield Club Cattle Show did in the winners of the chief prizes at the Islington Agricultural Hall. The supply of fresh beef is at an end in the once luxurious capital of France'. From "Illustrated London News", 1871.