4.30 
©ommuntcations; anH eTagc-s. 
Ars veterinaria post medicinain secimda cst.— Veyetias, 
ON THE DIFFERENT METHODS OF CASTRATION, 
Uy W. Goodwin, Esq. M.R.C.S., and Veterinary 
Surgeon to the King. 
[Read at the meeting of the Veterinary Medical Society, Oct. 29, 1828.] 
MY attention having been accidentally called, by a French 
Veterinarian, to a method of castrating the horse, as it is usually 
performed and generally approved of in France ; and an oppor¬ 
tunity having presented itself, during my French friend’s stay in 
London, to perform it, I was led, under his guidance, by way of 
experiment, to adopt it in a case that happened at the time to 
come under my care for operation. 
The result proving very satisfactory, I was induced to pmctise 
it in several others that I have since had to operate on ; and I am 
now desirous of laying before the profession, through the medium 
of our Society, an account of my little experience in the per¬ 
formance of this operation, in order that its merits may be duly 
canvassed, and put to the practical test by other practi¬ 
tioners. The novelty of performing a new operation of this kind 
has possibly induced me to attach greater importance to it 
than it merits; and though I may in this way have formed a 
higher opinion of it than I should otherwise have done, it shall 
be my study not to conceal from you any part of the unsuccessful 
cases that have come under my notice. 
In enumerating the various methods of operation that ai'e gene¬ 
rally practised, it is not my intention to enter into, a minute 
account of them, but rather to advert to them only as I may 
find it necessary, in comparison with the operation I have just 
alluded to. 
Castration is a surgical operation, that consists in either re¬ 
moving certain organs necessary to propagation, or in annulling 
their functions. In this country the operation is performed by 
removing the testicles of the male, and the ovaria of the female. 
But in others, this effect is produced by destroying only the 
structure of the testicle, as is the case in this operation on the 
horse in India. In France, too, bulls are never operated on ex- 
