Secretary SESSIONS. We have another subject for this forenoon. We have just about half an hour that we can allow for it. The gentleman who is to speak to us has enough to tell us to take a couple of hours, I have no doubt, and it is probably best that he should begin now, so as to save all the time. I think, Mr. Chairman, you had better call on Mr. STOCKBRIDGE. I am sorry our time is so limited.

The CHAIRMAN. Gentlemen, I have the pleasure now of introducing to you Prof. Levi STOCKBRIDGE of Amherst, chairman of the Cattle Commission, who will talk upon the "Work of the State Cattle Commission."

WORK OF THE STATE CATTLE COMMISSION.

BY PROF. LEVI STOCKBRIDGE, CHAIRMAN.

Mr. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE *: —I deem it fitting that a representative of the Cattle Commission should come here and speak of the work of the commission, and especially so because the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is indebted to the efforts and the influence of this Board for the formation of the Cattle Commission, and for the fact that we have had any legislation for the purpose of suppressing contagious diseases among our domestic animals.

Now, you will please excuse me if I say a word about the history of this legislation and the history of the diseases among our cattle, for reasons which I will show before I close. Our first legislation was in the year 1860. The cause of that legislation was the bringing into this country from Holland of two Holstein, or, as they were then called, Dutch cattle, which, when landed in Massachusetts, were found to be both sick with some disease almost unknown, practically unknown to all the veterinarians we had in the State at that time as a disease which they had ever handled or seen, although as educated men they might know a good deal about it from the books. These two animals went to a town near Boston, and were put into a large herd of the same kind of cattle. Both of them soon died, and in the course of a month, or a little more than that, other cattle in the herd were found sick, exhibiting the same symptoms that the originally imported cattle exhibited. This importation was in June, 1859. A few animals were scattered in the adjoining towns from where these cattle were first placed, and one poor calf was taken from there to Brookfield. In

Stenographic Report by C. E. Barnes.

Brookfield that calf came in contact with some two or three large herds of cattle, and these exposed animals soon after came in contact with the cattle of quite a large section of country in and around the Brookfields. The disease developed rapidly, produced great losses at once, and the people became very much alarmed. The inhabitants of Brookfield petitioned the Legislature for some sort of legislation which would enable the city or town to control the disease, and this petition was most thoroughly backed up and supported by the Board of Agriculture. The result was that in April the old original cattle commission law, or the old original law for the suppression of contagious diseases among cattle, was passed, and a small appropriation made to pay the expense; and, if I remember rightly, Paoli Lathrop of South Hadley, Dr. G. B. Loring of Salem and Amasa Walker of Brookfield were appointed as these commissioners. Immediately on receiving their commission they made a survey of the field which was infected with the disease, and were appalled to find the condition that existed. They saw at once that under the provisions of the law as it was passed it was utterly impossible for them to combat the disease. As you doubtless remember, the law was that a herd that had become contaminated with the disease, where a single animal was sick, whatever was the condition of the remainder of the herd, that whole herd should be slaughtered. Remember this was the stamp-out policy; it was the only true one. The whole herd should be slaughtered, and the State would pay for all the well animals, all found healthy after killing. The commissioners found that the appropriation was not large enough for them to begin to do the work. Rather than have it stop, some members of the Board of Agriculture contributed largely to provide money that the work might go on. The old Massachusetts Society agreed to pay two thousand dollars for the same purpose, but as the commissioners worked, the thing enlarged and enlarged until they found it was clearly beyond any possibility of private individuals paying the expense of stamping the disease out, and therefore a special session of the Legislature was called, which met in the same season, in the month of May, and a much larger appropriation was made, and then the work went on.

Now, this appropriation enabled the commissioners to kill the leading herds where the disease existed, but there were threads leading out from these places where cattle had gone that had not yet been found, and where it was altogether probable that the disease would still be found to exist; and these facts were reported to the Legislature of 1861 in the annual report of the Cattle Commissioners, but the Legislature in its wisdom decided that it would make no appropriation that year; it thought that what was left of the disease in the State would doubtless die out, and no appropriation was made, and as a result the Cattle Commissioners resigned. The disease did not die out. It was found existing in the State in secluded spots, and in 1862 the Board of Agriculture now you mark, gentlemen, this law comes back to the Board of Agriculture- the Board of Agriculture memorialized the Legislature, setting forth the facts in the case, and asking for another appropriation for the purpose of finishing the disease. An appropriation was made; the work went on, and the Cattle Commissioners made their annual report in 1863, and said, "It is very doubtful whether we have killed out all the threads of the disease that have been scattered through the Commonwealth," and they asked for another appropriation. The Legislature in its wisdom refused to make the appropriation in 1863, and the Board, of course, resigned; but in 1864 the Board of Agriculture, not satisfied, memorialized the Legislature again, and an appropriation was made, new commissioners were appointed, and the work went on. The commissioners reported in that year, 1864, that it was doubtful whether the disease was absolutely stamped out. An appropriation was made in 1864, and again in 1865, but after 1864 the Cattle Commissioners reported that from 1864, that is, in 1865 and 1866, not a case was found in Massachusetts, and all the threads of that disease had been traced out. The last diseased cattle found were just over the line in New Hampshire.

Now, then, let me make this statement, because I find that the people of the Commonwealth, the farmers of the Commonwealth, have not taken it in fully. There has never been a case of contagious pleuro-pneumonia in the State of Massachusetts since the year 1864. That ended it; it was stamped

out. The work of stamping it out cost the State of Massachusetts pretty nearly a hundred thousand dollars, but it cost private individuals a very much larger sum. Thus much for that first contagious disease, and for the action of the Board of Agriculture in relation to it.

The commissioners resigned, and we went without a commission until 1868 (it was during Governor Bullock's administration), when one day there went out from the governor to three gentlemen in this Commonwealth a simple notice like this: "You have been appointed a Cattle Commissioner. You must leave home immediately and come to the governor's department at the State House;" and the three gentlemen were there immediately, as quick as the train could come, and this information was given them: "There seems to be a terrible disease all along the line of cattle transportation. As far as we know, cattle have been coming into the Brighton market in a condition little better than dead. Large numbers have been killed soon after coming into the market;" and he said, "Last night a train load of cattle came into Brighton with many dead cattle in the cars, and others so sick that they could not get up. Every dead one and every sick one was dressed last night, and was sold in Quincy market this morning, and something must be done. It is a new thing, and nobody knows anything about what it is." The commissioners then appointed took their oath of office and started out immediately, going to Brighton, and took a survey of the whole field, and finally found that they must go to Albany, and there make an investigation. It was done, and they found that in the cattle yards at Albany they had six hundred sick cattle that were being killed as fast as they could be killed by two or three gangs of men, and taken to the bone-yards, where they were disposed of, and there the commissioners learned that this disease was all along the line of cattle transportation from Kansas to Brighton. It was Texas or Spanish fever. The whole country was alarmed. It seemed to be the duty of the Cattle Commissioners to guard Massachusetts from the hordes of cattle that were coming on; and all we did there was to make an arrangement with the Boston & Albany Railroad that no cattle should be received upon their trains unless they