26 VETERINARY MEDICINE AND SURGERY. 



or one that lias the least particle of refuse left after former use, will set 

 up inflammation. Third, when pinning up, any dragging upon the skin 

 will cause a thrombus : including the vein will cause inflammation : and 

 tightening the figure of eight ligature over the pin too much will cause 

 gangrene of the skin, inflammation, and suppuration, or a sloughing 

 process. 



No securing is required, but a snaflie bridle is to be preferred. Having 

 brought the horse's neck, near or left side, to a good light, we take a 

 a sponge freshly wrung out of water and smoothe the hair with it over 

 the bleeding place. This should be the bottom of the upper third of the 

 neck. Next we get an assistant to elevate the chin, and keep it elevated 

 all the time. A tall assistant will rest the chin of a medium-sized horse 

 on his shoulder, whilst a short assistant will find his head the best, with 

 the hand or hands as a cushion. If the assistant cannot spare a hand to 

 cover the eye next the bleeding side, a duster had better be used as a 

 blinder. Now the operator should take the clean fleam, moistened with 

 his saliva — not dipped in bad, rancid oil or lard, or anything which will 

 inoculate — in his left hand, holding it between his forefinger and thumb, 

 and make steady pressure, wWiout dragging upon the sJcin, upon the 

 vein with the remaining fingers of his left hand. He must be patient, 

 and keep up a steady pressure thus — resting his right hand, which holds 

 the blood-stick, upon the mane — for two or three minutes, or until the 

 vein has risen and is quite ropy and tense. He now quietly lowers the 

 fleam, and lays it along the vein in its central axis, and then quietly 

 brings the stick forwards and gives the fleam a heavy blow, when there 

 will be a spurt of blood. It is not essential, but it is far better, to keep the 

 left hand quietly pressing upon the vein, and let the assistant or a third 

 person hold the receptacle for catching the blood. A third person is 

 best; then it allows the head to be kept elevated and steady, and allows 

 the operator to keep up his steady pressure to the end. 



Before commencing, it is a good plan to form a rough estimate of the 

 capacity of the receptacle for the blood — usually a common stable pail; 

 then we stop when six pints have been drawn for a large horse and a 

 heavy bleeding, or when four, or even three pints, have been abstracted 

 for a bleeding Avhose object is to relieve the right side of the heart — as in 

 enteritis, etc., where we have a small, wiry, emjjty artery, and the blood 

 at first flows black and ' treacly ' in a thin stream. A good indication 

 for stopping the bleeding and pinning up consists in a larger flow com- 



