FIRST AID TO THE SICK AND INJURED 437 



22. FIRST AID TO THE SICK AND INJURED 



It is important that horse owners and those in charge of animals should 

 be able to render temporary assistance in the case of accident or sudden 

 illness, as by timely aid valuable lives are saved, while, for want of some 

 elementary knowledge such as the St. John's ambulance classes provide, 

 animals as well as men lose their lives or suffer permanent disablement 

 unnecessarily. 



The good Samaritan who would render assistance to an animal by the 

 way, or the other on his own premises, is met with an initial difficulty 

 almost unknown to those whose help is offered only to fellow-men. Horses, 

 even the smallest of tliem, are not easily controlled when suffering acute 

 pain added to fright; they cannot be reasoned with, or lifted when they 

 fall, by the power of any one person, and furthermore, active as well as 

 passive opposition is too frequently offered to those who would give succour 

 to a wounded animal. 



Whether on the road, in the field, or in the stable, occasions arise when 

 horses need prompt and energetic assistance from their attendants while 

 professional aid is being summoned. 



On the road, broken knees, collisions, &c., may divide the flesh and set 

 up profuse bleeding from an artery or vein of large calibre, and unless 

 haemorrhage is promptly arrested death may be the result. 



In the huntinsf field one looks for a certain number of accidents and 

 injuries, but how few owners and attendants are in any way prepared to 

 deal with them! 



In the stables, horses get loose and injure one another, or, getting 

 "cast" as it is called, spend their strength in useless efforts to regain their 

 feet, and in the absence of assistance frequently suffer irreparable injury. 

 In many ways, then, both in the stable and the field, " first aid " may be 

 wanted. 



The bewilderment of sudden and novel circumstances, and the natural 

 revulsion that is felt to blood by all who have received no training in 

 surgery, put the horseman to a disadvantage when called upon to render 

 help for which he is quite unprepared. In the chapter on wounds it has 

 been pointed out that bringing the edges together is of the first impor- 

 tance, and here again the reader may be reminded that the first and most 

 likely step towards arresting hsemorrhage is to be gained in that way. 

 Often a number of small vessels pouring out their contents at the same 

 time alarm the amateur in surgery, but are of no serious consequence, and 

 it is found tliat when brought together by tiie closing of the wound with 



