438 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub Doc. 



of livelihood ; that, while the value of a single cow may be 

 small, the aggregate capital invested by this class in such cattle 

 is large ; that there are to-day in this State 223,536 head of 

 neat stock, which, upon the average value for milk or beef 

 purposes, as found by appraisal of animals destroyed by the 

 commission, of $37.72 a head, means a total investment in such 

 cattle of $7,657,405 ; that, inasmuch as the commission, as 

 based upon its work in the field during the past six months, 

 has found that there are probably ten per cent, of the stock 

 throughout the State tuberculous, this means a destruction of 

 perhaps $765,740 worth of such cattle on a health basis; and 

 that, if the agricultural class are obliged to bear this entire loss, 

 it means not only a ruin of their business in the State, but a 

 consequent loss to the public, because it will drive the dairy- 

 men from the State, and thus cut off the local source of milk 

 supply upon which the citizens depend, and which can, while 

 such cattle are within the State, be so regulated through the 

 systematic examination of all cattle within the limits that the 

 public will be assured of a healthful supply of milk; whereas, 

 if this business be driven from the State, this milk must come 

 from cattle kept without the limits, where the Commonwealth 

 cannot regulate the healthiness of the stock from which it is 

 derived, and therefore the State will fail to accomplish one of 

 the principal objects hoped to be obtained by this work, — 

 i, e., a supply of milk free from this source of contagion. 



They assert that the policy of paying for the animals found 

 by the tuberculin tests to be affected does not substantially vary 

 in practice from that which was adopted in the case of pleuro- 

 pneumonia ; that in the case of that disease, animals which 

 showed upon physical examination that they were diseased 

 were destroyed without payment, while animals which did not 

 so externally exhibit the disease were only destroyed upon pay- 

 ment to the owner of the full health value ; that when tubercu- 

 lin is used, many animals reached and destroyed are those 

 which, if a physical examination were relied upon, would not 

 be detected, and would only be destroyed upon the theory that 

 the contagion cannot be eradicated except by the destruction of 

 all of the animals in the herd which have been exposed to it; 

 and that, as in such case the owner would receive the full health 

 value, he should not be deprived of that value because the 



