No. 4.] REPORT OF CATTLE BUREAU. 159 



contagious diseases of animals, and of every section in the 

 law that refers in any way to meat inspection or to the rela- 

 tion and duties of boards of health to the Cattle Bureau. 

 I^inety-seven stamps for branding carcasses of animals killed 

 and inspected for food have been furnished to 77 cities and 

 towns during the year ending ISTov. 30, 1909. Eighty-four 

 cities or towns have rei^orted licensing 234 slaughterhouses or 

 establishments where meat products are prepared, and 4 

 licenses have been reported as revoked in 4 towns. 



The law relating to licensing slaughterhouses and report- 

 ing them to the Chief of the Cattle Bureau is not well ob- 

 served, and in addition to the slaughterhouses reported as 

 being licensed there are undoubtedly many unlicensed ones, 

 or, if licensed by the local authority, they are not reported to 

 the Chief of the Cattle Bureau. 



One trouble with the present system of requiring local 

 boards of health to furnish the inspection for licensed slaugh- 

 terhouses is that the expense places on many small towns the 

 burden of providing a system of meat insj)ection for the 

 larger neighboring cities and towns where the meat is mar- 

 keted, while the small towns where the slaughterhouses are 

 derive very little or no benefit from it. In the neighborhood 

 of the larger cities abattoirs should be built, with a proper 

 water supply, sewage connections, and an up-to-date rendering 

 plant, where butchers could hire stalls, or where an individual 

 could take an animal, have it killed for a small sum and have 

 the carcass returned to him if it passed the slaughterhouse 

 inspection ; then all the dirty little barns and sheds rigged up 

 for slaughterhouses should be abolished. With the building 

 of such establishments it might be possible to secure federal 

 inspection for many of them, and thus relieve the State of a 

 part of the expense of maintaining the inspection ; or it might 

 prove desirable to have municipal abattoirs built for the 

 larger cities of the State, owned by the municipalities, 

 where butchers doing a small business could hire stalls at a 

 reasonable rental, thus making it impossible for a single firm 

 or individual to obtain control of the buildings. On the other 

 hand, in remote rural communities the small slaughterhouse 

 is almost a necessity, and ought to be encouraged. With the 



