6 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



rinderpest or cattle plague, which has carried off more than two 

 hundred thousand of the finest animals, has become sufficiently 

 well known to confirm the wisdom and sound judgment of our 

 own State authorities in the course adopted to prevent the intro- 

 duction and spread of contagious diseases among our stock. 



It is possible that in the early stages of our efforts to arrest 

 the progress of the pleuro-pneumonia, when the disease was less 

 understood than it is now, a somewhat larger number of cattle 

 were destroyed than was absolutely necessary to secure the 

 object in view ; but no one can be so short-sighted as not to 

 admit that it was better to err on the side of safety than to run 

 the risk of incurring the losses which would inevitably have 

 followed neglect ; for we know now that every conceivable expe- 

 dient was adopted by the English government to avoid the harsh 

 necessity of a resort to the " stamping-out process," and that it 

 was compelled to come to it at last, and to admit that it was the 

 only effectual means of avoiding a far more terrible disaster, the 

 losses in two years being about twenty millions of dollars. 



By a reference to the following Report of the Massachusetts 

 Commissioners on Contagious Diseases among Cattle, it will be 

 seen that the aggregate cost to the State of extirpating the 

 disease from our herds has been less than seventy thousand 

 dollars, an amount which must appear trifling when compared 

 with the results attained, and the exemption secured, by .the 

 efficient efforts of the State Board of Agriculture, and the too 

 little appreciated labors of the Cattle Commissioners. This 

 gives a cost to each inhabitant of the State of six cents for the 

 seven years' operations, while to each poll tax-payer it was less 

 than twenty-two cents, or about four cents a year. 



To the Honorable Senate and House of Representatives of the Commomvealth 



of Massachusetts. 



The Commissioners on Contagious Diseases among Cattle, in 

 submitting their Report, congratulate the people of the Com- 

 monwealth upon the probable extinction of the disease, (no case 

 having come to their knowledge since October, I860,) which but 

 a few years since threatened to be of so serious a character, viz., 

 pleuro-pneumonia. 



The Commissioners have been called to several towns during 

 the past year to examine diseased animals, yet not a case of 

 contagious pleuro-pneumonia has been found. 



