FORTY-THIRD ANNUAL CONVENTION 139 



I take pleasure in introducing to you Mr. Aitken, of Flint, 

 Mich., President of the Holstein-Friesian Association of America, 

 and he will tell you about a real cow." (Applause.) 



Mr. Aitken: 



"I think it is perhaps significant, since the toastmaster 

 called your attention to the fact that there were forty odd speak- 

 ers on the program this evening and only an hour and ten min- 

 utes' time, that it would limit each one to a minute and three- 

 quarters, and I apprehend that it would be sufficient time in order 

 to tell you anything new about dairying. 



It seems to be in vogue here, and the time largely consumed 

 in telling you some stories and I can only remember one a friend 

 of mine tells about starting from Syracuse to go to Utica. There 

 w^as a large traveling man with a large front porch taking prac- 

 tically all of the seat and a little boy standing up beside him 

 with a covered basket in his hand. The conductor came along 

 and asked the traveling man: ^Can't you move along a little?' 

 The fat' man gathered himself together and the boy sat down, 

 and then there was no room for the basket, so the conductor put 

 it up on the rack above the traveling man and the traveling man 

 was sort of dozing along and finally something began dripping 

 on his face. 'That package of pickles must have busted in that 

 basket of yours, boy,' he said. 'Aw, naw, that isn't pickles in 

 that basket, that's puppies.' (Laughter.) 



I can sympathize with my friend breeding Jerseys about his 

 hair turning: gray and aging rapidly, if he has been selling Jer- 

 seys at auction, and I can realize how a man w^ould age and turn 

 gray selling Jerseys under any condition. (Laughter). But the 

 Holstein-Friesian breeders, my friends, never have to talk about 

 the breed of animals they represent. They occupy a good deal 

 the position, so far as dairy animals are concerned, of a great 

 beautiful mastiff in corripany with ordinary mongrels of various 

 species. It is not necessary for him to bark in order to be known, 

 his greatness is assumed by every person, and Avhile these great 

 records that seem to be a thorn in the flesh of some breeders are 

 usually in the flesh of those breeders who are not breeding Hol- 

 stein-Friesian. I want simply to bring you a sort of message, 



