[Footnote A:  Loc. cit.]

CASE IV.—­Cart gelding.  Free clinique; navicular disease.  Injected subcutaneously over the metacarpal nerves on each side 6 grains of cocaine in aqueous solution.  During the operation the animal manifested no signs of pain whatever, not even when the nerve was cut.  This animal received altogether 12 grains of cocaine (3 grains were given on either side first, then fifteen minutes afterwards the same dose repeated).  The effect was manifested on the system in ten minutes after the second injection by clonic spasms of the muscles of the limbs (the legs being involuntarily jerked backwards and forwards at intervals of about twenty seconds), which materially interfered with the performance of the operation.  The animal was also continually moving the jaws, and was very sensitive to sounds, moving the ears backwards and forwards.  This hyperaesthesia, as evinced by the movement of the ears, lasted for some considerable time after the animal had been allowed to get up.

Cocaine hydrochlorate solutions, if intended to be kept for any length of time, should have added to them when freshly made 1/200 part of boric acid in order to preserve them.  Even then they are liable to spoil, and should, for subcutaneous injection, be made up just before needed for use.

CHAPTER V

GENERAL REMARKS ON OPERATIONS ON THE FOOT

A. METHODS OF RESTRAINT.

Many of the simple operations on the foot, such as the probing of a sinus, the paring out of corns, or the searching of pricks, may most suitably be performed with the animal’s leg held by the operator as a smith holds it for shoeing.  According to the temperament of the animal, even the operation for the removal of a portion of the sole, or the injection of sinuses with caustics, may be carried out with the animal simply twitched.

When the operation is still a simple one, casting inconvenient or impossible, and the animal restive, the twitch must be supplemented by some other method.  The most simple and one of the most effective is the blind, cap, or bluff (Fig. 38).  With it the most vicious animal or the most nervous is in many instances either cowed into submission or soothed into quietness.

At the same time, more forcible means than the operator’s own strength must be taken to hold the animal’s foot from the ground.  If the foot is a fore-foot, and the point desired to be operated on is to the outside, the pastern should be firmly lashed to the forearm by means of a thin, short cord, or a leather strap and buckle.  Much may then be done in the way of paring and probing that would otherwise be impossible.

[Illustration:  Fig. 38—­The BLIND.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 39—­THE SIDE-LINE.]