34 THE LUNG PLAGUE OF CATTLE. 



ment to the West ; for there, too, the spirit of progress and the desire 

 to secure the best blood are everywhere seen, the more so that no gulf- 

 coast fever threatens to kill off the imports. 



THE TRADE IN EASTERN CALVES A SOURCE OF DANGER. 



Though individual owners of western ranches have practiced the ship- 

 ment of calves from the east for a number of years, it is only three years 

 since this trade has assumed any considerable magnitude as carried on 

 through consignees, who resell the stock in the western stock-yards. 

 The growth of this trade has been so rapid that Mr. Frank D. Bartlett, 

 of McCurdy, Beveridge & Bartlett, the principal dealers in this class of 

 stock in Chicago, assured us that $1,500,000 worth of calves had passed 

 through the Chicago stock-yards in the fifteen months preceding August 

 30, 1881. The effect on the eastern market has been such that calves 

 which formerly would bring $6 to $10 have this year brought $12 to 

 $15. 



Formerly, in the dairying regions of New York and Pennsylvania, 

 most calves were killed (Deaconed) at birth, but the new demand for 

 young animals has taught the daily farmer that he can bring up calves 

 largely by hand, on skim- or buttermilk or whey, with a reasonable ad- 

 dition of linseed meal or malt, and thus secure a double profit from the 

 milk and cheese on the one hand, and the young stock on the other. 



There are fortunately several reasons why the supply should be drawn 

 from the dairying regions of central and western New York and Penn- 

 sylvania rather than from the infected area east of the Alleghanies. 1st. 

 The price of milk in the vicinity of the the large cities is so high that 

 none can usually be spared after the two or three days which follow 

 parturition. 2d. The milk being sold sweet, there is no available pro- 

 duct buttermilk nor whey to feed to the calves. 3d. Calves can be 

 easily disposed of at any time to be worked up into sausages or other 

 questionable products. 4th. Throughout Long Island and New Jersey 

 there is a large demand for calves of all ages, the very young to be put 

 upon milch cows for speedy fattening, and the older to be raised as store 

 cattle. 5th. The railway journey from the infected districts to Chicago 

 and other western marts is a long one and trying to the young stock ; 

 especially to such as have been already shipped one or two hundred 

 miles eastward to the New York market. For very young calves, fed 

 exclusively on milk, the long journey is virtually prohibitory. 



There is, however, another side to the question : 1st. Eastern milk- 

 men may soon learn to raise calves on malt and linseed meal, and vir- 

 tually without milk. 2d. The eastern 1 demand for calves is not contin- 

 uous, the area to be supplied being a limited one, and more easily filled 

 up than the boundless West. When, therefore, the New York or Phil- 

 adelphia market is glutted, and the calves are being held at a large 

 daily outlay, there comes a strong temptation to ship them to where a 

 certain market awaits them. 3d. The poorest lots, which take the mar- 

 ket worst, and will not pay for keep, and which are usually the most 

 suspicious, are the most likely to be thus shipped. 4th. The distance 

 from New York city to Chicago is no greater than from Jefferson and 

 Saint Lawrence Counties, New York, from which many of the calves are 

 now sent. 5th. The through rates of freight from the large cities in 

 the east, to those in the west, are more favorable to the shipper than 

 they are from the country districts where the calves are now mostly 

 picked up. 6th. Finally, that the dealers themselves look to the eastern 

 cities for stock, we have the evidence of a letter from a Chicago com- 



