ice, lend additional force to the recommendation for a revision of
the general laws on this subject.

The laxity of ideas prevailing among a large number of our people
regarding pensions is becoming every day more marked. The principles
upon which they should be granted are in danger of being altogether
ignored, and already pensions are often claimed because the applicants
are as much entitled as other successful applicants, rather than upon
any disability reasonably attributable to military service. If the
establishment of vicious precedents be continued, if the granting of
pensions be not divorced from partisan and other unworthy and irrelevant
considerations, and if the honorable name of veteran unfairly becomes by
these means but another term for one who constantly clamors for the aid
of the Government, there is danger that injury will be done to the fame
and patriotism of many whom our citizens all delight to honor, and that
a prejudice will be aroused unjust to meritorious applicants for
pensions.

The Department of Agriculture has continued, with a good measure of
success, its efforts to develop the processes, enlarge the results,
and augment the profits of American husbandry. It has collected and
distributed practical information, introduced and tested new plants,
checked the spread of contagious diseases of farm animals, resisted the
advance of noxious insects and destructive fungous growths, and sought
to secure to agricultural labor the highest reward of effort and the
fullest immunity from loss. Its records of the year show that the season
of 1888 has been one of medium production. A generous supply of the
demands of consumption has been assured, and a surplus for exportation,
moderate in certain products and bountiful in others, will prove a
benefaction alike to buyer and grower.

Four years ago it was found that the great cattle industry of the
country was endangered, and those engaged in it were alarmed at the
rapid extension of the European lung plague of pleuro-pneumonia. Serious
outbreaks existed in Illinois, Missouri, and Kentucky, and in Tennessee
animals affected were held in quarantine. Five counties in New York and
from one to four counties in each of the States of New Jersey,
Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland were almost equally affected.

With this great danger upon us and with the contagion already in the
channels of commerce, with the enormous direct and indirect losses
already being ca