AMPUTATION OF THE PENIS. 535 



horse was discharged. A fortnight afterwards he was readmitted, with 

 the penis swollen again, supposed to have been occasioned by some stimu- 

 lating application having been used to the part. Some such treatment 

 as had been before employed was recurred to, with the addition of blood- 

 letting from the femoral vein, and the exhibition of doses of powdered 

 white hellebore in water. Six weeks after admission, Mr. Sewell ampu- 

 tated the penis "• by slow and cautious cuts," alternating the cuts with 

 cauterizations. Considerable hemorrhage followed the operation. After 

 three weeks' further treatment, the horse was sent away with " enlarge- 

 ment and thickening of the sheath," though reduced from what it had 

 been ; " the part originally diseased still remaining." 



Mr. Snewing's ('Veterinarian,' vol. xi, p. 568) patient was an aged 

 pony which had been purchased ten days prior to the operation by his 

 present owner, who, on riding him home, discovered, while he was in the act 

 ofstaling, the penis unusuallyprojected, but took no further notice of this 

 until he came to alight, when he perceived the yard still drawn, and that 

 it was bloody : there were also visible around the margin of the sheath 

 marks of stitches, rendering it evident that means had been taken to brace 

 up the organ, which, from some cause, had become incapable of being 

 retracted. Vexed at the trick that had been played him, he sent for the 

 knacker to despatch the pony ; the knacker, however, in a laudable spirit 

 of humanity and disinterestedness, persuaded him first to seek medical 

 advice. Mr. Snewiiig was sent for, and found the poor animal much 

 emaciated, with " a mass of corruption" — as the owner described it — 

 hanging from his belly, which was found to be a portion of penis in a 

 state of ulceration, or rather gone on to gangrene, discharging " a thin 

 watery sauious fluid,with blood, and highly offensive matter." — " There was 

 also present what may be considered paraphymosis, arising from serous 

 infiltration into the cellular tissue which connects together the convolu- 

 tions of the sheath, producing strangury of the lower end of the penis." 

 Mr. Snewing concluded that nothing but amputation close up to the 

 groin could offer any chance of relief Having washed the parts with a 

 solution of chloride of lime to destroy the fetor, he included, by means of the 

 caustic clams, between two long thin pieces of iron, the upper parts of the 

 sheath and penis, and approximated their ends with strings sufficiently 

 close to make the required compression. " I next proceeded," continues 

 Mr. Snewiug, " cautiously to incise the lower portion, securing by liga- 

 ture in my progress the pudic arteries, and other vessels of importance. 

 Near to the side of the penis I met with an encysted tumour, containing 

 some thick crude offensive matter. On cutting through the urethra, a 

 purulent matter escaped. Another cut carried my scal[)ol through the 

 penis, which, by its retraction, prevented nie securing a vessel on its 

 dorsum, and which continued to bleed rather freely for a few minutes ; 



