PLEUROPNEUMONIA. 
115 
As the experiments instituted are not concluded, the result will appear in a 
future report. 
The amount of hills audited, exclusive of the various sums to which the 
several towns are liable, is thirty-eight hundred aud seventy-five dollars and ten 
cents ($3,875.10), and by estimate, it will require twenty-five hundred dollars to 
pay the outstanding bills, making the total sum expended nearly six thousaud 
four hundred dollars, ($6,400). 
Respectfully submitted. 
E. F. THAYER, 
CHAS. P. PRESTON, 
Commissioner s. 
MINORITY REPORT. 
To the Senate and House of Representatives :— 
Gentlemen, —Having received the appointment as Commissioner on Conta¬ 
gious Diseases of Cattle, and not being able to subscribe to the Report which 
the Board of Commissioners have seen fit to present, I beg leave to submit the 
following as a minorty report:— 
All must admit the importance of arriving at a correct conclusion in relation 
to the disease existiug among the cattle of the New England States, known as 
pleuro-pneumonia. For if what is so generally said by those who have had the 
better opportunity to examine the subject be true, viz., that the future value 
of the neat stock in this country depends upon the vigilance used to check the 
spread of the disease by the destruction of the cattle having the disease, or 
having been exposed to the same,it is certainly difficult to calculate the import¬ 
ance of vigilant action in this direction. If, on the other hand, it be true that 
all that is necessary is to use the care and precaution used in the treatment of 
ot her diseases, then the course which has been thus far pursued by this Common - 
wealth can be viewed in no other light than that of an unwarrantable waste of 
property, which, if followed, may involve the loss of many millions of dollars. 
I suppose it not far from a just estimate to put the amount expended by 
the State, and the loss suffered by individuals to the present time at two hun¬ 
dred thousand dollars, ($200,000;) and when or where this expenditure is to 
cease, no prudent man will venture an opinion. Two years ago the Commis¬ 
sioners announced that they were happy to be able to say that no case then 
existed in the State that they were aware of, and the public were led to believe 
that they were finally relieved of the terrible scourge ; and yet there have been 
since that time more than a hundred cases! Had the present Board been called 
upon to make their Report two months since, I doubt not they would have been 
happy in trying to quiet the fears of any of the timid. All at once there breaks 
out ou Deer Island, in one of the better herds, if not the best one in the State, 
as bad a case as has come under their observation during the season. 
Believing that a just conclusion as to the proper course to be pursued can 
only be arrived at by a careful consideration of the facts bearing on the following 
questions, viz: Is the disease contagious ? if so, to what extent ? Is it curable? 
To what extent is it fatal? Are the animals affected with the disease worth 
keeping through a common course of it, either for fattening, milking, breeding, 
or working purposes ? I present the following as all the facts I have been able 
to obtain ! 
