24 BOAED OF AGRICULTUKE. 



sider a contagious disease in this State, and no formal notice 

 is taken of it ; I refer to tuberculosis. It is one of the most 

 insidious and hardest of all diseases to recognize, and the 

 situation requires some action on the part of the Board of 

 Agriculture. It is a hereditary disease. You can trace it 

 from generation to generation, in direct descent. There is, 

 also, no doubt about its transmissibility by the material 

 which is thrown off from the lungs ; and I have seen a case 

 of supposed pleuro-pneumonia that proved to be tuberculosis. 

 It is only a few days since I saw a herd of once fine animals 

 rotten with tuberculosis. The owner said, "I wish you 

 would tell me what to do." I said, "I cannot help you." I 

 should like to hear some suijo^estions in reo;ard to it. 



Professor Stockbridge. The doctor has said what I in- 

 tended to have said in regard to this matter of tuberculosis. 

 That there has been such a disease in Massachusetts the Board 

 of Cattle Commissioners have long known, but the veterinary 

 colleges have never agreed upon the question whether it was 

 contagious or not. There has been a long and somewhat 

 acrimonious dispute in relation to it, and the consequence has 

 been that the Cattle Commissioners have never recognized it 

 or treated it as a contagious disease. We have always 

 known that it was hereditary, and that it might be conta- 

 gious, but we have never been prepared to say that it went 

 by germs in the atmosphere, and in that way spread from herd 

 to herd. But people are getting better educated in this 

 matter, and I find that a majority are now coming to believe, 

 and are acting upon the belief, that tuberculosis is not only 

 contagious but infectious. 



I hope that the Board, either at its present meeting or at 

 their meeting in Boston, which will be held later, will ask 

 the Legislature of Massachusetts to memorialize Congress on 

 this subject. What we have voted to do here to-night is 

 very well, but if we can induce the Massachusetts Legisla- 

 ture to memorialize Congress on this subject it will be a 

 stronger appeal, and one to which Congress will listen. 



The Chairman. If you are going to take such action it 

 must be done at this meeting, because our annual meeting is 

 not held until the 1st of February, and that would be too 



