194 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



presumed they escaped contamination. We have frequently 

 been notified duriug the year by town-officers of supposed 

 cases of Spanish fever, hog-cholera, and other diseases ; but 

 investigation has shown them to be of a different t3-pe, and 

 not contagious. A case of this kind occurred on the 10th 

 November at Taunton, when Mr. Evander Pray informed us, 

 that, of a drove of swine in his possession numbering twenty, 

 twelve had died, and others were affected. A visit to the 

 place, and an examination of one of the dead animals, 

 proved that the disease was identical with that of the calves 

 in Rhode Island, and of which mention has been made above. 

 With the exception of glanders, no disease of that kind has 

 come to our notice ; and notwithstanding the many isolated 

 cases of common sickness among cattle, and a mild form of 

 epidemic in horses, the domestic animals in the State have 

 been generally healthy, and its stock interests, whether they 

 relate to the animals themselves or their products, have been 

 unusually prosperous. The sum appropriated for the pur- 

 poses of the Commission for the year was two thousand dol- 

 lars. There has been expended of this sum in bills paid 

 or now due •"i^l,693.10, leaving an unexpended balance of 

 f 306.90, — a sum, in all probability, too small for the require- 

 ments of the year to come, if effort in the ordinary work of 

 the Board is to be continued, but especially so if there should 

 be an outbreak of contagion among cattle, a liability of 

 which there is great danger in consequence of the immense 

 transportation of stock through our territory from every part 



of the West. 



Levi Stockbridge, 



E. F. Thayer, 



H. W. Jordan, 



Commissioners on Contagious Diseases among Cattle. 

 BosTox, Jan. 7, 1881. 



ANNUAL MEETING OF THE BOARD. 



The Board met at the office of the secretary, in Boston, on 

 Tuesday, Feb. 1, 1881, at twelve o'clock, liis Excellency 

 John D. Long in the chair. 



Present : Messrs. Anderson, Baker, Bowditch, Goessmann, 

 Grinnell, Gleason, Hadwen, Hersey, Herrick, Lane, Lynde, 



