t50 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



Commissioners of Maine might be grateful to them for the 

 lesson we have taught them in this regard, and thankful 

 that, from their comparative isolation and distance from the 

 great lines of cattle transit and market, it may be possible 

 for them to accomplish something by the process, though 

 infection will infallibly reappear in consequence of the 

 existence of the disease among her human population. 



"With existing conditions in Massachusetts, which it does 

 not appear to be within the range of human possibilities to 

 change, to stamp out this disease, as recommended by Dr. 

 Bailey, would be for us to kill and pay for all the cattle of 

 the northern and western States and of Canada which come 

 to our market for sale and distribution, as well as our home 

 stock. This cannot be done, and would not eradicate the 

 disease if it could, because, as in Maine, contamination of 

 the cattle would follow from the presence of the disease in 

 our human population. For these reasons our Board has 

 believed our wisest as well as really our only course to com- 

 bat this disease was by elimination in accordance with the 

 rules and regulations published in our last report, and by 

 presenting the sale of rnilk and meat which might possibly 

 be infected. But does tuberculosis prevail in Massachusetts, 

 taking into account both its home stock and that which is 

 brought here for slaughter and is in transit, to such an 

 alarming extent as is represented by Dr. Bailey ? To again 

 t r ive an answer in the negative, we here introduce the testi- 

 mony of the inspectors to which allusion has been made. 

 Dr. Bry den of Boston, the inspector of live cattle and dead 

 meats exported from Boston by the British steamships, 

 makes the following report on his own work and that of Dr. 

 Alexander Burr, inspector of dead meat for the Board of 

 Health of the city of Boston, and which was published in 

 the " American Cultivator" of Jan. 3, 1891. After allud- 

 ing to the reported condition of market stock in this country 

 and Europe, he says : — 



My contention is that about five per cent of the cows in the 

 neighborhood of our large cities, with two per cent of cows, calves, 

 oxen and other cattle in country districts, is sufficiently sensa- 

 tional and alarming, and an estimate that will more than cover the 

 cases of tuberculosis among the cattle population of Massachu- 



