CYSTIC OR VESICAL CALCULI. 511 



best learnt from taking tlie narration of a case he sent to 

 'The Veterinarian/ in 1847. It runs thus : — 



A grey gelding, aged, the property of C. Smith, Esq., of Balham, 

 Surrey, was sent into Mr, Field's hospital for horses on the 28th of July 

 last. The symptoms being'unequivocally those of stone in the bladder. 

 Mr. Field determined at once to perform the operation. Accordingly, after 

 some two or three days' of preparation, the horse was cast and secured in 

 the manner usual for lithotomy, and went through the operation without 

 anything extraordinary occurring : the casting and liberating and opera- 

 tion, altogether, not occupying more than twenty minutes. This being 

 the sixth case on which Mr. Field has operated, five out of which have 

 proved successful, and his mode of operating being as simple as it is 

 effectual and safe, it may be desirable here that we should briefly run 

 through its details. For the male subject he needs no more instruments 

 than staffs scalpel^ and forceps ; whicli ought to be long enough in the 

 blades to admit of being opened wide while in the bladder, for the female* 

 forceps only : nor does the latter require to be cast for the operation ; it 

 being most conveniently performable on her in the standing j5osture. The 

 male subject being cast, and turned upon his back, with his hind legs 

 drawn forward, the staff — which is a polished iron one, of unusually large 

 size, with a curve at the end, having a groove along it — is passed through 

 the penis along the urethra, and pushed on until it abuts against the sym- 

 physis pubis, or rather until its curved part has entered the curvature of 

 the urethra, which it will readily be found to do. Thus introduced, the 

 staff is to be committed to the operator's assistant, and by him held in the 

 upright position, at the same time that its end is kept steadily maintained 

 within the curvature of the urethra : this will enable the operator readily 

 to make an incision with his scapel through the perineum into the groove of 

 the staff, of ample dimension to admit his forceps ; which are now, after the 

 finger has been introduced into the passage to make everything clear, to be 

 insinuated, and with moderate but suflicient force to be pushed onwards 

 into the bladder. No gorget or bistoury is used to dilate or to incise the 

 urethra; but a pair of straight forceps, having narrow spoon-shaped 

 blades, are at once cautiously introduced, the urethra, through its ex- 

 treme elasticity or dilatability, giving way to them.^ The stone extracted 

 in the present case was of the mulberry description, of a round oblong 

 shape, and weighed four ounces and a half. It was dark-coloured, and 

 possessed a strong urinous odour. The extraction of the stone was fol- 

 lowed up by injections of tepid water into the bladder. Immediately 



Docs not the urethra suffer laceration or tearing open. 



