No. 4.] CATTLE COMMISSIONERS. 489 



tuberculin test, and to buy only animals that have been 

 tested with tuberculin. 



The funds appropriated by the State for the eradication 

 and control of contagious animal diseases should first be used 

 for the regular work of the Board, including the expenses 

 attendant upon the taking of such cattle as are found to be 

 diseased which the local inspectors have quarantined. If, 

 after this is done, the Cattle Commissioners have sufiicient 

 funds at their disposal, what is known as "voluntary 

 request work" should be done; that is, the Cattle Com- 

 missioners may test an entire herd at the owner's request, 

 provided he agrees to buy only tested cattle after those that 

 react are removed, and will also agree to thoroughly disinfect 

 his stable as directed by the Board, and take all such other 

 measures to keep his herd free of the disease as may be 

 recommended. 



In doing such work, care must be taken to choose only 

 such farms as have buildings that can be thoroughly disin- 

 fected, or where the owner has a new barn into which he 

 wishes to move a herd which suffered from this disease in the 

 old barn. There are many New England farm barns that it 

 is almost impossible to disinfect ; here, voluntary request 

 testing is of no value. The owner must either pay more 

 attention to hygiene and cull out the bad cases from time to 

 time, or, if he wishes to entirely eradicate tuberculosis from 

 his herd, he must decide to build a new stable. 



A single test is not always sufficient to remove all the dis- 

 eased animals ; hence, a second should follow the first within 

 two or three months. The applicant must understand that 

 it may be necessary to repeat the test, and to repeatedly dis- 

 infect in order to have the work successful, and that this 

 requires intelligence, patience, perseverance and some expen- 

 diture of money. 



There are two sides to the question of dealing with bovine 

 tuberculosis, — one is its bearing upon the public health, the 

 other is that it is an insidious, slow-developing, infectious dis- 

 ease of the bovine, yearly inflicting considerable pecuniary loss 

 upon the dairyman and stock breeder. It has been allowed 

 to continue its ravages unnoticed and unchecked for many 

 years, until we have awakened to the fact that our herds are 



