CASTRATION. 
I8 5 
and glory. I do not think he ever received a dollar in money 
for it, but he had lots of glory and some fun. 
After I became old enough and had gathered considerable 
experience, I thought I knew enough to work for pay. At that 
time we used the English hobbles, and cast every animal we 
operated upon. My only knowledge was that of any other 
young country castrator, and I frequently encountered serious 
and fatal complications. Broken limbs, broken ribs, broken 
backs, spavins, cubs and bruises from throwing the animal and 
tying him down were of common occurrence, and I always felt 
(as I do yet) a sigh of relief pass over me when an animal I had 
thrown got up and stood upon his feet again. I was glad to 
learn anything new, and new methods or new kinds of instru¬ 
ments that I considered were superior to those I had employed, 
I always accepted and used thereafter. During the closing 
years of the late war I was located in the Southwest, and often 
in conversation with citizens or soldiers of that locality, I would 
talk “horse” with them, as the saying is. I frequently heard 
horsemen of that section talk of castrating stallions and colts 
without throwing them. I thought they were either crazy or 
fools, or thought everybody else was. I was too sceptical to 
think it possible for an animal to stand still and allow so pain¬ 
ful an operation to be performed on him without kicking the 
operator’s brains out, if he had any. 
When, however, a little later, I saw an old man of nearly 
sixty years of age, in a little over a half day, apparently with 
ease, castrate between sixty and one hundred wild Texan ponies 
that had been raised upon a ranche and never handled (when it 
certainly would have required several days to have caught and 
cast the same number), and not one of the ponies, as far as I 
could see, made even an attempt to kick. I came to the con¬ 
clusion I was the fool, and not the Texan. Not a rope or hob¬ 
ble of any kind was upon any of them. 
The animals were corralled in large pens, and driven thence 
into close stocks and confined therein by sliding bars, over and 
under their necks, this of course held them, and it was impossi- 
