466 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



Long custom at these markets had established the practice 

 of having the regular market day for the sale of animals upon 

 Wednesday in each week. In order that the dealers might 

 have their animals at Brighton ready for the market on Wednes- 

 day, their regular transportation companies had arranged for 

 trains to bring cattle to these markets so that they should 

 be delivered on Monday night and Tuesday morning of each 

 week. The animals were then allowed a day of rest before 

 being offered in the market, during which time they were 

 given ample feed and water, and whatever attention the owners 

 considered necessary, in order that they might be in as good a 

 condition as possible on the day of sale. 



In order to make a proper, examination with tuberculin, it is 

 necessary to submit the animal to the test for a period of at 

 least twenty-four hours, not including the time necessary for 

 taking proper preliminary temperature observations, in order 

 to determine with reasonable accuracy the normal temperature 

 of the animal before injecting the tuberculin. 



It will be remembered that the conditions which confronted 

 the commission when this work was inaugurated were that the 

 animals, in the great proportion of cases, did not arrive at the 

 market much more than twenty-four hours before they were 

 offered for sale. In order, therefore, that these animals might 

 be tested before being offered in the market, if the market day 

 was kept the same as heretofore and the animals were delivered 

 at the same time, it was necessary to begin the test immedi- 

 ately upon their arrival, and therefore no time was given to 

 quiet the animals before applying the test, or to feed and pre- 

 pare them for sale in the market after the test was completed. 



The first step undertaken, therefore, by the commission, as 

 being the one that would produce the least inconvenience to 

 the dealers, and which they hoped would be accompanied by 

 favorable results, was to change the market day from Wednes- 

 day to Thursday in each week. Under this arrangement the 

 tests were begun upon Tuesday night and were not completed 

 until late in the afternoon of Wednesday, at which time the 

 animals which had shown no reaction to the tuberculin were 

 delivered over to the owners. This arrangement was unsatis- 

 factory to the dealers, because it gave them but little more 

 than twelve hours in which to prepare the animals for market, 



