78 
GEORGE H. BAILEY. 
separable from the germ, and that where no germ exists, we can 
have no tuberculosis, and no tuberculosis without the germ. 
While tuberculosis is not confined to any breed, nor is any 
breed positively exempt from it, my experience as cattle com¬ 
missioner has led me to the belief that as far as Maine is con¬ 
cerned, it is largely an imported disease. The fact that so many 
high-bred and in-bred cattle have come into this State, and that 
so large a proportion and percentage of them proves to be dis¬ 
eased, has led me irresistibly to the conclusion that to them we 
largely owe the present condition of our milch herds, as recently 
disclosed through the aid of tuberculin tests, while the impres; 
sive fact remains that we have scarcely ever been called upon to 
condemn a native bred animal of the old-fashioned, rugged “ red 
or brindle ” type so familiar to us all; and when an owner writes 
me that he suspects his cow, and adds that she is a “ foreigner,” 
I am apt to think he has made out a prima facie case. It can¬ 
not be denied that the number of victims to tuberculosis in¬ 
creases with the improvement in, or specialization of our breeds 
of domestic animals, more and more in-bred for the production 
of beef or milk ; that extreme specialization—that exaggerated 
activity of the vegetative life in the absence of proportionate 
muscular exertion, that once acquired is susceptible of being trans¬ 
mitted by way of heredity. Animals of a lymphatic or nervo- 
lymphatic temperament, attenuated figure, narrow chests, 
blondes, if you please, do they not remind one of hot-house 
plants, as compared with the vigor and hardiness of native “ out 
of door ” flowers and fruits of the same varieties, and may we 
not well take a lesson from the Seminole Indians who dwell in 
the Everglades of Florida and who punish with death any mem¬ 
ber of their tribe who marries any relative however distant ? 
The New York State Commission on tuberculosis-in cattle 
say “ The investigations of this commission have shown that 
tuberculosis is under certain conditions congenital; that its gen¬ 
eral diffusion is due to contagion, but that a small proportion is 
disseminated by hereditary transmission.” 
