do would be to get them out. That was about the first time that I ever noticed that it was rot to feed cattle to go on the cars to get the best results. The nearest feed and water was Salt Lake, a run of fifteen or eighteen hours. The cars were dry, and there was not a steer down in the 2,000 head when they came in, and the cattle were in fine shape. That taught me a lesson which I always have remembered.

Mr. STEVENS, of Minnesota. Can you arrange with the railroad companies as a rule to have the unloading and feeding, or whatever you wish, done as you want it?

Mr. PARSONS. Yes, sir; almost always. Not always, but almost always.

Mr. STEVENS, of Minnesota. They consult you, then, whenever it is practicable?

Mr. PARSONS. They do, sir.

Mr. STEVENS, of Minnesota. Under those circumstances, what length of time do you calculate would be best for the wild-range cattle to remain on the car, to the best advantage of the cattle?

Mr. PARSONS. I think that it would make a difference whether they were spring cattle or fall cattle. In the spring, cattle are naturally weak, especially after the first green grass comes, and you can not keep them on their feet as long as you can in the fall. It will not do to handle them the same way you would in the fall, when they are fat, and the feed is dry. But I have never had any trouble in feeding them and running them from thirty to thirty-four and thirty-six hours. I do not believe in running them longer than thirty-six hours, although I have run them for forty-two and forty-five hours. But I do not believe it is good policy, and I never have done it but once or twice in my life, and that is when I was compelled to.

Mr. STEPHENS, of Texas. What would you think of a law that would make the limit as it now is twenty-eight hours with the right to let them remain as much as thirty-six hours on the cars at the written request of the owner? Would that be satisfactory?

Mr. PARSONS. That is exactly what I think should be done. There are times when a person does not want his cattle to remain in the cars over twenty hours, perhaps, or, as I have said, perhaps not over fifteen or eighteen hours.

Mr. BURKE. The railroads do not require you to keep them on twenty-eight hours if you want to take them off, do they?

Mr. PARSONS. If I want to unload my cattle it is their duty, and they have always recognized it, to let me do it at the first side track where they have unloading chutes; to let me unload them and get them in shape.

Mr. BURKE. And that rule is generally observed?

Mr. PARSONS. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Is that all that you have to say to the committee? Mr. PARSONS. Yes; except that I wish to file the following letter as a part of my testimony:

Hon. M. K. PARSONS,

Salt Lake City, Utah.

SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH, February 15, 1906.

DEAR SIR: The present 28-hour limit law compels stock to be unloaded after it has been aboard cars twenty-eight hours, and often causes severe suffering for live stock and heavy financial loss to the shippers.

During the season of 1905 I ́shipped thousands of cars of sheep and cattle from western ranges to eastern markets. The reports of the men in charge of these shipments show, almost without exception, that the stock suffered severely en route through the enforcement of the 28-hour limit law. were often compelled to unload at stations where there were absolutely no facilities for feeding, watering, or unloading and loading stock.

They

Last July we loaded a train of choice fat lambs near Weiser, Idaho. Under the 28-hour limit law we were compelled to unload them on the Snake River desert with practically no accommodations in the way of grazing, water, or shade. The lambs stood around in the sweltering heat for a while, and then we reloaded them and ran them a short distance to Soda Springs, Idaho, where we had pasture, shade, and water. These lambs not only received no benefit through being unloaded on the desert, but were punished severely and shrunk a great deal in weight through the jamming and sweltering in unloading, loading, and standing around in the hot sun. Had we been permitted to run thirty-six hours the lambs would easily have reached Soda Springs, Idaho, where we had made preparation to care for them, and they would not have been subjected to the severe punishment they underwent through the enforcement of the twenty-eight-hour law.

All of our shipments were unloaded at Laramie, Wyo., to graze, and shippers with stock for Omaha and Chicago were instructed to run from Laramie to Valley, Nebr., to graze. In a large number of instances the shipments would not make Valley within the twenty-eight-hour limit and the railroad people would stop the shipment at Grand Island or some other point in that vicinity where there were no feeding or watering facilities. Usually these delayed shipments would reach Grand Island in the night, and as it is impossible to unload sheep in the night they would remain on the cars until daylight. Were they permitted to run until daylight, they would have had ample time to reach a desirable grazing point and the sheep would have fared much better with the cars in motion than they did standing in the freight yards at Grand Island, waiting for daylight. The accommodations at Grand Island are very poor, and when compelled to unload there we always loaded out just as soon as we could do so, and after a few hours' run unload at some point where we could graze and care for the sheep properly.

The above are the conditions as they were along the Union Pacific last season. They were practically the same over the other roads.

No one is more interested in having live stock properly handled while en route than the owners, for the reason that stock which is not fed, watered, and handled properly while en route arrives at the market in bad condition and shrunk in weight and will not command as high a price as stock in good condition, and will not weigh as much. Furthermore, no one is in better position to judge whether twenty-eight or thirty-six hour runs are best for live stock than the men who are in the live stock shipping business, and I know of no stockman who does not feel that the twenty-eight-hour limit causes cruelty, hardship, and privation for live stock and a financial loss for the stockman as well as for the railroad companies to whom the extra unloading and loading means extra expense.

The chief object of the twenty-eight-hour law, as I understand the matter, is to prevent cruelty to animals. One of the main results of the enforcement of this law has been cruelty to animals-the very thing the law aims to prevent. During the season of 1905, several shipments of choice fat lambs and sheep which we made from western ranges were subjected to so much starvation and other forms of punishment through the enforcement of the twenty-eight-hourlimit law, that by the time they reached the eastern markets they were so badly shrunk and in such poor condition generally, that they were unfit for butcher purposes and were sold for feeders, resulting in a heavy financial loss for us. Any measure which will permit us to ship our stock without abusing it as we were compelled to last season has my hearty support, and I trust some such measure will become a law soon.

Yours, very truly,

Mr. Saunders shipped over 1,000 cars in 1905..

B. F. SAUNDERS.

M. K. PARSONS.

TESTIMONY OF A. J. KNOLLIN, ESQ.

Mr. KNOLLIN was duly sworn by the chairman, and testified as follows:

The CHAIRMAN. State your name, residence, and occupation.

Mr. KNOLLIN. A. J. Knollin; Chicago, Ill.; stock grower and handler and dealer and commission merchant, depending principally on stock growing and dealing for livelihood and profit.

The CHAIRMAN. What class of stock do you raise mostly?
Mr. KNOLLIN. Sheep, mostly.

The CHAIRMAN. Will you tell us what the effect of the present law is, and what would be the effect of the proposed change in the law?

Mr. KNOLLIN. With others, I was sent by the National Wool Growers' Association, and was instructed by the association to say that we were a unit in stating that the twenty-eight-hour limit law was working great hardship upon us; that it defeated the purpose for which it was originally drafted; that it worked hardship on our stock, instead of eliminating it.

It is facts that you want, and having, I might say, a very large personal experience covering a great many years, having been raised in this business, I was selected by the Wool Growers Association, which has a membership of 1,500,, so that we could not all come. I was delegated, not for my ability to argue the point, but from the fact that I have had personal experience in shipping sheep principally extensively.

One of the important points that I wanted to cover has been so thoroughly covered by Doctor Dyson that I will only pass that by saying this: That in going with stock trains myself, being with them for six days from the far West, I have noticed that sheep will go thirty-six to forty-eight hours without apparently showing any sign of hunger. A sheep is a ruminating animal, and as long as it can chew its cud I take it that it is absorbing nutriment in the stomach. That point has been brought out so clearly that I will just say that from practical experience and observation I agree with every word that Doctor Dyson said on that point.

I wanted to speak just to inform Mr. Whitehead with reference to the way we generally handle our shipments of sheep in the far West, before loading.

The CHAIRMAN. We would a great deal rather have you inform the committee about something.

Mr. KNOLLIN. This is for the information of Mr. Whitehead and the committee. We have found, and experience has taught us, that it will not do to load sheep that are filled. Our shipments from the West are made principally in the summer time. In the case of shipments made largely in September and October, it is customary to order our cars for daylight. The sheep are brought up to the pens the night before, grazed up to the pen, and watered, and probably yarded by 9 o'clock or 8 o'clock, and we start loading at daylight in the morning. Experience has taught us that sheep will load better when they are handled in that way than if we undertook to load them full in the evening, or undertook to load them in the heat of the day, which is sometimes impossible.

With reference to the 28-hour limit law injuring the sheep business east of the Mississippi River, I want to say that out of Chicago and Kansas City, Omaha, and St. Joseph, there were probably nearly a million sheep and lambs bought for feeding purposes by Ohio, New York and Michigan farmers. These sheep go out of Chicago, for instance, on a main line of railway, but they must be taken up a branch line to their destination. It is impossible for the roads to take the sheep through in twenty-eight hours, but in thirty-six hours they can nearly always be landed at home, where everything is well prepared to take care of them. So that the National Wool Growers Association, made up of sheep men from all over the country, are unanimous in condemning the present law.

With reference to shipping lambs: Lambs are shipped out of the far West in train lots, and they are shipped usually in the fall, about the natural weaning time. They are brought with their mothers as near to the shipping point as practicable, and cut away and loaded into the cars, and they act a good deal when they are first loaded as they would when they were first taken away from their mothers when we were keeping them on the range and just weaning them. They run about and are uneasy. I have unloaded many trains where I know there would not be one-half of 1 per cent that would touch a drop of water. They had been used to tender feed up in the mountains, and when they got down to the plains, where at that time of the year feed has dried up, they will run about, and they will not eat; and it will take ten men and ten dogs to hold a train-load of lambs. together and keep them from scattering all over. They know nothing about eating dry hay. I do not believe the suffering of lambs in transit is greater if they could be rushed through in thirty-six hours, or even longer. I do not think they suffer more than they do at weaning time, when we have that same trouble about feeding them.

The CHAIRMAN. From how far west do they ship lambs to the eastern market?

Mr. KNOLLIN. From Washington and Oregon.

The CHAIRMAN. How far east do they ship lambs from Washington and Idaho?

Mr. KNOLLIN. I know of cases where they were shipped as far east as Chicago from Washington, and then sold to Michigan feeders and reshipped through to Chicago.

The CHAIRMAN. During all that shipment the lambs do not eat or drink? Is that your statement?

Mr. KNOLLIN. After four or five days they will eat; and I will say in that connection that shipments of lambs are never sent clear through from the range right on to the market.

The CHAIRMAN. That is what I was trying to find out.

Mr. KNOLLIN. They are brought down, in the case of the river markets, to points near the stockyards, and in the case of the Chicago market the same applies. As we get farther east a different condition prevails. We have different grass. It is generally green. The CHAIRMAN. Where do you ship lambs from?

Mr. KNOLLIN. Principally from Idaho and New Mexico.

The CHAIRMAN. And where do you ship them to from the ranges in Idaho?

Mr. KNOLLIN. I will say in that connection that I have shipped on an average for a good many years 2,000 carloads of sheep and lambs a year from the West, and they have been about evenly divided between the different markets.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, for instance, where do you ship any lambs to in the East from the ranges? Where do the lambs go to?

Mr. KNOLLIN. The final destination, you mean?

The CHAIRMAN. No; direct from the range.

Mr. KNOLLIN. Direct from the range they go to Omaha, St. Joe, Kansas City, and Chicago. They are the principal markets.

The CHAIRMAN. How long does it take to get to Omaha?

Mr. KNOLLIN. That depends on the run we get. We used to come through to Omaha from Idaho with two stops, one at Laramie and one nearer Omaha-Fremont and Valley.

The CHAIRMAN. Do the lambs eat or drink any at those places?

Mr. KNOLLIN. They generally eat and drink very little at Laramie, but when we get down to Valley, where the grass is tender, they will fill up. They are generally held there for forty-eight hours, and sometimes longer, in order to rest them and fill them up.

The CHAIRMAN. You turn them out and herd them?

Mr. KNOLLIN. Yes, sir. In the last year, under the working of the twenty-eight-hour law, we have had cases where shipments have been stopped five times before they got to the Missouri River market, and where they were twice as long in making the trip as they had been years previous.

The CHAIRMAN. At these places where they stopped under those conditions, was there grass upon which they could be turned out?

Mr. KNOLLIN. At Laramie the grass at that time of the year is generally dry and they do not care for it. They are taken away from their mothers and they will eat very little. They scatter all over, but they will not eat much. But when we get down to Valley they will usually settle down and fill up well, because there the conditions are different. There is more rain in the eastern country, and the grass is usually green at that time of the year, and the lambs will fill up on it.

The CHAIRMAN. You have referred to two places. I mean at all of these places where you had to turn out the lambs five times when the law was being enforced, was there an opportunity for the lambs to be turned out upon the grass?

Mr. KNOLLIN. I have some letters here that were written by men that were with sheep themselves. They were not written expecting to be used here, but for the purpose of making claims against the railroad, and I would like to read these letters, which will cover that point fully.

The CHAIRMAN. I would rather have your own opinion, if you have any. If you have not, it is easy to say so.

Mr. KNOLLIN. I will cite a case of a train of sheep sent in to Montpelier, Idaho, because they did not have time to make Laramie or any other point with them where there was any accommodations for handling them; and they stayed in the cars for seventeen hours. They were unloaded there with only a few pens, that would not accommodate the sheep. And after holding them a short time, without any attempt being made to feed them, because there was no accommo