This removal will leave a huge, ugly, gaping wound, with a seeming superabundance of skin hanging from its side. Let him on no account remove a particle of that skin, however much more than is necessary properly to cover the wound there may immediately after the operation seem to be. Inflammation will, with the beginning of the healing process, set in, and the action of this inflammation contracts the hanging skin; so that if a portion be removed, there will remain an open wound to that extent; and as skin is slowly reproduced, the cure may be retarded for months.
The first part of the business being well concluded, the dog must remain muzzled, and be returned to its proprietor with a bottle of healing fluid, the sore which has been made being left uncovered. The healing fluid is to be used frequently; and if the case be a good one, the orifice quickly becomes small, and heals. In some animals, however, there is a disposition to gnaw or lick the part; thus undoing everything the veterinary surgeon has been accomplishing. To check this habit, a cradle round the neck; wide collars which prevent the head from being turned round; and various splints which, by keeping the limb extended, thereby hinder the animal from touching the wound, are employed. Any or all of these, in untoward cases, may be necessary; and in very high-bred animals the healing powers of nature are frequently slow, consequently in such the after-consequences of an operation are likely to prove very annoying.
DOG BREAKING:
THE MOST
EXPEDITIOUS, EASY, AND CERTAIN
METHOD,
WHETHER GREAT EXCELLENCE OR ONLY MEDIOCRITY
BE REQUIRED.