No. 4.] REPORT OF CATTLE BUREAU. 155 



other things, to prevent cruelty to calves, and was supported 

 by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. It 

 has not, however, fulfilled the intention of its originators in 

 this respect, as this report will presently show. 



Section 71 of chapter 50 of the Revised Laws, as amended 

 by chapter 411, Acts of 1908, provides as follows: — 



Section 71. The board of health, by themselves, their officers 

 or agents, may inspect all veal found, offered or exposed for sale 

 or kept with the intent to sell in its city or town, and if, in its 

 opinion, said veal is that of a calf less than four weeks old when 

 killed, the board shall seize and destroy or dispose of it as provided 

 in the preceding' section, subject, however, to the provisions thereof 

 relative to the disposal of money. 



Nothing in section 1, chapter 329 of the Acts of 1908, in 

 any way repeals the provisions of .section 71, chapter 56, Re- 

 vised Laws, as amended by chapter 411, Acts of 1908; yet 

 the inspectors and agents of the local boards of health con- 

 strue the law to allow them to pass the carcass of any little 

 calf three or four days old or less that dresses forty pounds. 

 The usual dressed carcass is supposed to have the legs cut off 

 at the knees and hocks ; but as this section specifies how the 

 carcass shall be dressed, the butcher cuts the feet off at the 

 ankles, and thus gains two or three pounds for the weight of 

 the carcass. In some places, if the dressed carcass is small 

 and skinny, a hollow needle, attached to a rubber tube from a 

 compressed air tank, is inserted into the connective tissue 

 among the muscles on the inside of the thighs, and the air 

 turned on, so that each little carcass presents a plump and 

 pleasing appearance to the eye of the uninitiated. 



Last spring, when the danger from foot-and-mouth disease 

 commenced to abate, it was decided to allow cattle to come 

 from certain parts of New York State on permits issued by 

 the Chief of the Cattle Bureau. Some of these were issued 

 to butchers in Brighton to ship calves from the dairy districts 

 of New York. It was found that on these permits calves 

 were being shipped to Brighton that were less than four weeks 

 old, most of them being not over three or four days old, and 

 distributed to various slaughtering establishments to be killed 



