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INVESTIGATIONS OF THE BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY. 699 
ports which are filled with the most brutal personalities, 
which give no account of experiments conducted in a scien¬ 
tific manner, which are lacking in those details necessary for 
their confirmation by other investigators, which above all are 
manifestly wrong in their principal conclusions—why are 
these reports now held up before us as too good to be ig¬ 
nored, and the reports of the Bureau of Animal Industry, 
written in part by members of this Association, denounced as 
they have been? Are you aware that this report of our com¬ 
mittee was no sooner published than it was circulated broad¬ 
cast by Billings as another vindication of his work and his 
methods ? Do you not know that he is repeating with Texas 
fever the role which he played with swine diseases—denying 
the existence of the true germ, and claiming the discovery of 
something else ? Why should this Association go out of its 
way to assist such a man in obstructing the progress of science 
and in vilifying its own members ? 
Gentlemen, I leave the matter with you, knowing that 
my own work has been carefully and conscientiously per¬ 
formed, and with the full confidence that every detail in the 
work of my scientific assistants has been done with equal care 
and honesty. It is for you to decide whether such reports 
from one of our leading committees are to be endorsed and 
encouragedv I express no opinion as to the honesty of the 
committee, but I do charge that its report was incorrect in 
both its statements and its conclusions, and inexcusable in its 
personalties. I do insist that this Association cannot afford 
to endorse such a report or to allow others like it to be pre¬ 
sented in the future, whether they affect me or any other 
member of this Association. The truth will finally prevail, no 
matter what our action may be, but if such mischievous re¬ 
ports continue to come from a leading committee you will be 
responsible for the loss of prestige, and influence to the Asso¬ 
ciation and the loss of good will between members which 
must necessarily follow. 
I 
