CHAPTER XXXV 



METHODS OP CONTROL 

 THE TWITCH— THE HALTER TWITCH— SIDE LINES— HOBBLES— SLINGS— ANESTHESIA 



Besides thoso referred to in the part of this work dealing with the 

 breaker's art, there are occasions when for medical treatment or surgical 

 operations it is necessary to control the patient by methods which form no 

 part of the ordinary education of the horse. There are simple contrivances 

 known to horsemen, and others requiring hobbles and expensive gear, or else 

 the production of local or general anesthesia. Horses differ so in tempera- 

 ment that while one individual will submit to firing with no greater restraint 

 than holding up a foot, another will have to be cast for the removal of a 

 wart. 



THE TWITCH 



This consists of a stout stick with a hole near one end through 

 •which a loop of cord of about the thickness of box-coi'd or clothes-line 

 is fastened. The operator passes the loop over his left hand, and with 

 the thumb and fingei's grasps the upper lip, on to which he places the loop, 

 and with his right hand proceeds to wind it tight so as to enclose and 

 compress this highly sensitive part of the animal (it will be remembered 

 that there is a plexus of nerves here situated), until he realizes that it 

 hurts him more to resist the twitch than to submit to some minor opera- 

 tion for which this cruel implement is used. Cruel it undoubtedly i.s, 

 and to be avoided when any other safe and effectual method of control 

 can be devised, but there are circumstances where its use is justifiable, and 

 the safety of human beings must ever take precedence over the comfort of 

 animals. There are not wanting foolish people who would expose the lives 

 and limbs of stablemen to great danger rather than their pets should be 

 put to the least pain or inconvenience, the base selfishness of which does 

 not strike them until after an accident has happened. 



THE HALTER TWITCH 



An ordinary hempen halter and rope answers well enough. This is 

 put on in the usual way, but there must be no knot or check in the rope, 

 wliich is made into a half-hitch, passed over the ears and the loop carried 



