The Operation for Roaring. 151 



The animal is thrown down in the usual manner, on a 

 good bed of straw or moss litter. The chloroform bag 

 is put on ; the tray having been previously removed from 

 it, the chloroform is now poured over the sponge in it, and 

 it is inserted in its place in the bottom of the bag.i The 

 suitable state of narkosis having been induced, and which 

 is promptly arrived at in from one to two or three minutes 

 — being indicated by cessation of struggling, more tranquil 

 breathing, the appearance of the eye, and the loss of sensa- 

 tion — the animal is placed on his back and maintained there 

 by sacks filled with straw, placed close under each side of 

 the body. If there is a beam above, the hobble-rope may be 

 passed over it and held by one or two men; this will 

 maintain the body in the dorsal position. Or, with the 

 same object, a man may be placed on each side with an 

 arm round a fore leg. The neck and head are extended in 

 a line with the body, the head being placed on the vertex, 

 and kept steady by an assistant. The operator places him- 

 self in a kneeling position on the off, or right, side of the 

 body, if he be right-handed, beside the neck, with his back 

 to the shoulder and face towards the head. 



He is now ready to operate, and for clearness of descrip- 

 tion the operation may be divided into three stages. 



^ The quantity of chloroform required to produce complete narkosis 

 does not vary much. For the great majority of horses one and a half 

 ounces has sufficed, and a very few required two or two and a half ounces. 

 More than seventy horses have been chloroformed for this operation 

 without a single mishap ; and though it is generally maintained that, 

 to ensure safety, the drug should be administered with a free ad- 

 mixture of air, yet into this bag very little air can enter, and the 

 horse must breathe almost pure chloroform. The rapidity with which 

 insensibility is produced without any trouble in administration, the 

 great economy in chloroform, and the brief delay in return to con- 

 sciousness, are important advantages to be gained by the use of 

 Carlisle's bag, while the after-effects are scarcely perceptible. By the 

 ordinary way of administering chloroform, a large quantity of the 

 drug is required — as much, sometimes, as eight or ten ounces, or even 

 more— the inhalation often occupying half an hour, and recovery from 

 the effects is generally protracted. 



