Error is propagated with the rapidity of lightning; before it every
obstacle disappears, and popular favor seems to welcome it. Truth, on
the contrary, is received with indifference, often even with doubt,
suspicion, and distrust. Indeed, how often have we not seen the author
of a discovery which, having been accepted and realized ought to have
advanced the public good and increased the general welfare, come into
contact with the hatred, the ignorance, and the envy, and thus become
the laughter of fools and the jest of the wise. To some the inventor
seemed without good sense; to others an ignoramus. Too feeble to struggle
against all, he died broken hearted, and left to his powerful antagonists
the glory of having, perhaps for ages, buried his discovery, and to those
who bring to perfection cities and fields the deprivation of a good up to
that time unknown.
If more happy than those martyrs for a new idea, I should reach, at last,
that which concerns me, after twelve years of incessant struggles, to
cause the truth to appear to the eyes of all, I should have nothing more
to desire. Nothing would remain for me, except to bless the generous
hearts which shall have aided me in triumphing over routine and error;
then on quitting this world, only to bequeath the worthy men who have
so bravely encouraged and seconded my efforts, the task of simplifying
my discovery, and rendering my method popular to cause the analytical
knowledge of cattle to penetrate even into the most obscure hamlet, and
while dividing thus with me the glory of having done this good, their
names will be held in grateful remembrance by future generations; such
has been the idea which has guided every moment of my life, all the
efforts of my mind.
For nearly twelve years, since I have given my method to the public,
through a first edition of my “Treatise on Milch Cows,” the savants and
the practitioners have been greatly prepossessed with it. When they have
seen me make a successful application before them of my system, by a
single inspection of animals which I saw for the first time, they have
expressed a lively surprise.
In the vegetable kingdom, skillful nurserymen have distinguished more
than eighty different orders of pears of summer, of autumn, and of
winter; each of these orders has its distinctive characteristics, as many
for the shape and the taste of the fruit, as for the time of ripening.
And when a tree-grower or an amateur is sufficiently skillful, he
distinguishes marvelously all these species one from another by a single
inspection, and at whatever time of year it may be. He knows equally well
what exposure it is necessary to give to each of them to obtain exquisite
fruits.
My first studies had been directed toward arboriculture. I have practiced
with my father during many years. My principal occupation was the cutting
of trees, grafts, both splits and bandages, and by studying vegetables, I
had acquired the idea of and an insight into classifications.
I was better prepared thus for my work of classifying the bovine race, a
work which no one had ever tried, either theoretically or practically.
My classification of the characteristic signs, embraces all the races of
France and other countries, without distinction of sex or age.
Unknown, up to this day, although they have always existed, these signs
have escaped all the world, even the sagacity of the most celebrated
painters, as well as that of veterinary doctors of the highest
reputations of all times.
The appearance of my method should mark an era, for it opposes and
overturns all the prejudiced routines according to which people have
practiced up to this time.
It opens a new era in an art in its infancy, in a science whose first
principles even were unknown. I should then expound it with the greatest
detail.
This method is of the greatest simplicity, whatever has been possible
to be said of it, and whoever will become thoroughly familiar with the
escutcheon of the first order of each class, will be able to judge of all.
Escutcheons are ten in number. They extend, according to their class,
from the centre of the four teats to the level of the upper extremity
of the vulva, and may extend in breadth from the middle of the hinder
surface of one leg, to the middle of the hinder surface of the other. By
their form or configuration, escutcheons characterize and distinguish the
ten families which together constitute my classification. Behold, then,
to what is reduced, in reality, this pretended immense complication.
A special figure, placed at the end of each class, serves to indicate
mongrel animals.
Each of the _classes_ or families is characterized by an escutcheon of
fixed form, always similar to itself, while one does not get out of that
class or that family, but variable in the dimensions of its surface. That
dimension or that surface should be estimated by square centimeters, but
that would be too complicated for the practical man; since it depends
on the size of the individual, it is estimated by the limits of the
escutcheon placed on the hinder part of the animal. The extreme limits
are the hams, the interior surface of the legs and vulva. The surface of
the escutcheon, of which the extent varies, has permitted me to divide
each class or family into _six orders_, for each one of which I assign,
in taking account of the shape, the quantity, the continuation, and the
quality of the milk.
The escutcheon of the first order is the most developed; is also
the best marked. The escutcheon of each of the five other orders is
similar in form to that of the first order. It is, in some sort, only
a proportionate reduction—a diminutive. It is the escutcheon of the
first order, with the dimensions reduced or brought within less extended
limits, reaching no longer the hock nor longer covering the interior of
the thighs, nor yet reaching up to the vulva, remaining consequently at a
distance greater or less from these boundaries.