THE TUBERCULOSIS CAMPAIGN IN VERMONT. 
731 
THE TUBERCULOSIS CAMPAIGN IN VERMONT. 
The report of the Vermont State Board of Agriculture, acting 
as cattle commissioners, has just been published, in a very clear 
and admirable summary of 44 pugcs. It details the work under 
the new law of 1894 up to July 1, 1896. The first step was to 
Prohibit production of cattle unless tested, this being done in the 
spring of 1895. Then C. M. Winslow was placed in charge of 
inspection in the first congress district and V. I. Spear in the 
second. The work done has been in all cases at the request of 
the owners of cattle, and so many requests have been made that 
it has been impossible to comply with them all. The work was 
first done in suspected herds and then extended to other herds as 
far as time permitted. It appears that “ the disease is not evenly 
or generally distributed in the herds throughout the State, some 
localities being almost entirely free from it.” Its introduction 
is not placed further back than 20 years, when cattle imported 
from Europe were brought into the State, and most of its prog¬ 
ress has been in the past ten years. A strong word is spoken 
for sanitation. 
But few tests have been made since July 1. In the 16 
months prior to that date, nearly 15,000 tests by tuberculin 
were made. u In the 441 cases condemned in the first district, 
439 were found to be diseased and in two we were unable to find 
disease; in the second district, of the 473 cases condemned and 
killed, disease was found in 471, only in two cases we failed to 
find tuberculosis and paid the owners full compensation.” A 
number of cases are reported in which the test failed to reveal 
the disease when present. It is intended to make a second test 
within a year or 18 months of the first, of all herds where dis¬ 
ease is found. Such tests made this spring have sometimes 
found one or two cases or none. 
The present indemnity law has operated so satisfactorily as 
a whole that the commission does not advise any change. It 
provides for appraisal of cattle killed by a person ^appointed by 
the board and another by the owner, and if these two cannot 
agree,_ they shall select a third, “ who, together with them, shall 
appraise the animal just before killing and on a basis of health, 
the limit of value being #40.” If upon post-mortem the animal 
proves to be tuberculous, the owner receives one-half appraised 
value, otherwise full value. 
The expenses of the commission have been less than $13,000 
for stock condemned. The two active commissioners have 
