Thursday. December II, 1890. 
829 
the agricultural administration and practice of the Austro-Hun- 
garian Monarchy. 
21. The Council have received an invitation from the Organising 
Committee of the International Congress of Hygiene and Demo- 
graphy, which will be held in London next August, under the presi- 
dency" of H.RH. the Prince of Wale3, to appoint delegates repre- 
senting the Society upon the General Committee of the Congress. 
As the Congress proposes to discuss the important subject of the re- 
lation of diseases of the lower animals to those of man, the Council 
have accepted this invitation, and have appointed the President 
and the Chairman of the Veterinary Committee to act as the 
Society's representatives. 
22. The scheme for the examination and registration of farriers 
or shoeing-smiths — to which reference was made in the last Report 
•was publicly inaugurated at a meeting held at the Mansion 
House on June 2 ; and, a sufficient guarantee fund having been 
raised to start the scheme on a proper financial basis, the Council 
have given their formal adhesion to it, and have nominated as 
their representatives on the Registration Committee the President 
of the Society for the time being, the Chairman of the Veterinary 
Committee for the time being, Sir Jacob Wilson, Mr. Charles Clay, 
^£ r . Walter Gilbey, and the Secretary. Up to the 31st instant, it 
is proposed to admit all shoeing-smiths to the Register without ex- 
amination, upon sufficient evidence of the skill of the applicant 
being produced ; but after the commencement of 1891, all candi- 
dates for admission to the Register will be required to undergo such 
examination as the Registration Committee may appoint. The 
Committee have promised to admit to the Register, free of charge, 
all the winners of prizes, a?id all commended competitors, at the 
Society's Horse-shoeing Competition to take place in the Doncaster 
Show-yard next June. 
23. In their last Report, the Council referred with satisfaction to 
the fact that a Bill for placing the slaughter of animals affected with 
pleuro-pneumonia under Government control, and for the payment of 
compensation at the cost of the Imperial Exchequer, had been intro- 
duced into Parliament by the Government. Since then the Bill has 
received the Royal assent, and is now (since September 1) in force 
throughout Great Britain. The Council readily undertook, at the 
request of the Board of Agriculture, to use the Society's influ- 
ence in securing for the Board the earliest intimation of outbreaks 
of the disease, and with that view issued a circular letter to all the 
Members, impressing upon them the great importance of prompt 
declaration of disease whenever it might appear, and of a loyal 
submission to the orders which may from time to time be issued by 
the Board of Agriculture. The Act has, since the appointed date 
of its commencement, been administered with firmness and strin- 
gency ; and, according to the latest information, the total number of 
cattle slaughtered under its provisions has been about five thousand. 
