HEARINGS BEFORE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE. 53 
to passing their examination at their veterinary colleges, pass a veter- 
inary examination of the Civil Service Commission. They are put 
a - ee a year and at the end of three years they are promoted to 
,400. 
Mr. Wricur. Are they deterred from doing other work as 
veterinarians? 
Mr. Saumon. Yes, sir. 
Mr. Havucen. Are they appointed from the locality where the 
inspections are being conducted? 
Mr. Satmon. No; the register for our veterinarians is a general 
register for the whole country. They pass the examination and go on 
a general eligible list, and we take them according to their standing on 
that list. They must go wherever we happen to need them. 
Mr. Lams. You get them through the Civil Service Commission ? 
Mr. Satmon. Yes. 
Mr. Henry. Some time ago you spoke of difficulty found in secur- 
ing expert help. 
r. SALMON. We have found difficulty in getting men fast enough. 
The Civil Service Commission has not been able to get men through 
the examinations fast enough. 
Mr. Henry. Has it not been your habit, as in other bureaus, to take 
young men from agricultural colleges and train them up in your work? 
Mr. Satmon. They all have to be veterinarians. 
The Cuarrman. They have to take that post-graduate course—the 
veterinary course? 
Mr. Saumon. Yes. 
Mr. Haucexn. Is this inspection free of charge to the packing houses? 
Mr. Satmon, Yes, sir. 
Mr. Grarr. How many of these inspectors are there? 
Mr. Satmon. We have about 400 now. 
The Cuarrman. Now, Doctor, to establish a quarantine line, is it 
absolutely necessary to have a veterinarian ? 
Mr. Sarton. Well, it is necessary to have a veterinarian to inspect 
the stock to see whether they are diseased or not. 
The CHarrMan. Take the case of sheep. Any farmer knows scab 
when it is in its active stage, of course; but when it first begins to 
break out and they begin to lose the wool, few would immediately 
recognize it. 
Mr. Satmon. Of course if the scab is very far advanced anyone can 
tell it, but then that is not the usual order of things. 
The Cuarrman. You could not tell it unless the wool had loops in it? 
Mr. Satmon. When an inspector sees a lot of sheep in the stock- 
yards with the wool loosening in spots and the sheep biting themselves, 
that is an indication that they may have scab. He has got to go and 
determine whether that is scab or not. He has got to take his micro- 
scope and scrape off the skin and know how to examine-it and find the 
scab mite and then he must know the scab mite when he finds it. It 
does not do to guess about those things. A man must be absolutely 
certain in his diagnosis of the disease. You may have an eruption 
from sheep being out ina cold rain. That will sometimes cause an 
eruption of the skin. Sometimes irritants of various kinds start up 
an irritation which a superficial examination would perhaps make one 
think was scab; but it would be an injustice to the owner of those 
sheep if it was not scab to hold them up and make him dip them, and 
