If your horse pokes out his head

If your horse pokes out his head

If your horse pokes out his head

Bridle reins should be soft, yet tough; so long, and no longer, so that by extending your arms you can shorten them to any desired length; then, if your horse pokes out his head, or extends himself in leaping, you can, if you hold the reins in each hand, as you ought, let them slip through your fingers, and shorten them in an instant by extending your arms. A very good sportsman of my acquaintance has tabs sewn on the curb-reins, which prevents them from slipping. This is a useful plan for ladies who ride or drive; but, as before observed, in hunting the snaffle-reins should slip through the fingers.

In this country we are so well waited upon

In this country we are so well waited upon

In this country we are so well waited upon

When you are learning to ride, you should take pains to learn everything concerning the horse and his equipments. In this country we are so well waited upon, that we often forget that we may at some time or other be obliged to become our own grooms and farriers.

For the colonies, the best bridle is that described in the chapter on training colts, which is a halter, a bridle, and a gag combined.

Especially with a high-spirited horse

Especially with a high-spirited horse

Especially with a high-spirited horse

It is of great importance, especially with a high-spirited horse, that the headpiece should fit him, that it is neither too tight nor too low down in his mouth. I have known a violently restive horse to become perfectly calm and docile when his bridle had been altered so as to fit him comfortably. The curb-bit should be placed so low as only just to clear the tushes in a horse’s mouth, and one inch above the corner teeth in a mare’s. There should be room for at least one finger between the curb-chain and the chin. If the horse is tender-skinned, the chain may be covered with leather.

And one of the best for a pulling horse

And one of the best for a pulling horse

And one of the best for a pulling horse

The Chifney is a curb with, a very powerful leverage, and one of the best for a pulling horse, or a lady’s use.

A perfect horseman will make shift with any bit. Sir Tatton Sykes and Sir Charles Knightley, in their prime, could hold any horse with a plain snaffle; but a lady, or a weak-wristed horseman, should be provided with a bit that can stop the horse on an emergency; and many horses, perfectly quiet on the road, pull hard in the field at the beginning of a run. But it should be remembered, that when a horse runs away, it is useless to rely on the curb, as, when once he has fully resisted it, the longer he runs the less he cares for it. The better plan is to keep the snaffle moving and sawing in his mouth, and from time to time take a sharp pull at the curb.

HANOVERIAN-BIT.

Which is a sort of snaffle-bit with cheeks and a curb-chain

Which is a sort of snaffle-bit with cheeks and a curb-chain

Which is a sort of snaffle-bit with cheeks and a curb-chain

The Pelham-bit (see cut), which is a sort of snaffle-bit with cheeks and a curb-chain, is a convenient style for this class of horse. A powerful variation of the Pelham, called the Hanoverian, has within the last few years come very much into use. It requires the light hands of a practised horseman to use the curb-reins of the Hanoverian on a delicate-mouthed horse; but when properly used no bit makes a horse bend and display himself more handsomely, and in the hunting-field it will hold a horse when nothing else will, for this bit is a very powerful snaffle, as well as curb, with rollers or rings, that keep the horse’s mouth moist, and prevent it from becoming dead (see cut). For hunting, use the first; if the Hanoverian it should not be too narrow.

PELHAM-BIT.

When a farmer buys a team of oxen

When a farmer buys a team of oxen

When a farmer buys a team of oxen

When a farmer buys a team of oxen, if he knows his business he asks their names, because oxen answer to their names. On the same principle it is well to inquire what bit a horse has been accustomed to, and if you cannot learn, try several until you find out what suits him. There are rare horses, that carry their own heads, in dealers’ phrase, safely and elegantly with a plain snaffle bridle; but except in the hands of a steeple-chase jock, few are to be so trusted. Besides, as reins, as well as snaffles, break, it is not safe to hunt much with one bit and one bridle-rein. The average of horses go best on a double bridle, that is to say, the common hard and sharp or curb, with a snaffle. The best way is to ride on the snaffle, and use the curb only when it is required to stop your horse suddenly, to moderate his speed when he is pulling too hard, or when he is tired or lazy to collect him, by drawing his nose down and his hind-legs more under him, for that is the first effect of taking hold of the curb-rein. There are many horses with good mouths, so far that they can be stopped easily with a plain snaffle, and yet require a curb-bit, to make them carry their heads in the right place, and this they often seem to do from the mere hint of the curb-chain dangling against their chins, without the rider being obliged to pull at the reins with any perceptible force.

PLAIN SNAFFLE.

If you wish to ride comfortably

If you wish to ride comfortably

If you wish to ride comfortably

If you wish to ride comfortably, you must look as carefully to see that your horse’s furniture fits and suits him as to your own boots and breeches.

Curb-bit.

On Horseman’s And Horsewoman’s Dress, And Horse Furniture.

On Horseman’s And Horsewoman’s Dress, And Horse Furniture.

On bits. The snaffle. The use of the curb. The Pelham. The Hanoverian bit described. Martingales. The gentleman’s saddle to be large enough. Spurs. Not to be too sharp. The Somerset saddle for the timid and aged. The Nolan saddle without flaps. Ladies’ saddle described. Advantages of the hunting-horn crutch. Ladies’ stirrup. Ladies’ dress. Hints on. Habit. Boots. Whips. Hunting whips. Use of the lash. Gentleman’s riding costume. Hunting dress. Poole, the great authority. Advantage of cap over hat in hunting. Boot-tops and Napoleons. Quotation from Warburton’s ballads.

If you are in the middle class

If you are in the middle class

If you are in the middle class

If you are in the middle class, with a small stud, never take a swell groom from a great stable he will despise you and your horses. Hunting farmers and hunting country surgeons train the best class of grooms.

When you find an honest, sober man, who thoroughly knows his business, you cannot treat him too well, for half the goodness of a horse depends, like a French dish, on the treatment.

Hints on Horses and Hunting, by Senex.

Side saddle.

Large stables are magnificent but a mistake

Large stables are magnificent but a mistake

Large stables are magnificent but a mistake

Large stables are magnificent, but a mistake. Four or five horses are quite as many as can be comfortably lodged together. I have seen hunters in an old barn in better condition than in the grandest temples of fashionable architects.

It takes an hour to dress a horse well in the morning, and more on return hot from work. From this hint you may calculate what time your servant must devote to his horses if they are to be well dressed.

Hunters should be placed away from other horses

Hunters should be placed away from other horses

Hunters should be placed away from other horses

Hunters should be placed away from other horses, where, after a fatiguing day, they can lie at length, undisturbed by men or other horses in use. Stables should be as light as living rooms, but with louvers to darken them in summer, in order to keep out the flies. An ample supply of cold and hot water without troubling the cook is essential in a well-managed stable.

Stables should be so ventilated that they never stink

Stables should be so ventilated that they never stink

Stables should be so ventilated that they never stink

Stables. Most elaborate directions are given for the construction of stables; but most people are obliged to put up with what they find on their premises. Stables should be so ventilated that they never stink, and are never decidedly warm in cold weather, if you wish your horses to be healthy. Grooms will almost always stop up ventilation if they can. Loose boxes are to be preferred to stalls, because in them a tired horse can place himself in the position most easy to him. Sloping stalls are chambers of torture.

In large towns there are always veterinary surgeons’ forges

In large towns there are always veterinary surgeons’ forges

In large towns there are always veterinary surgeons’ forges

As to Shoeing. In large towns there are always veterinary surgeons’ forges, where the art is well understood, and so, too, in hunting districts; but where you have to rely on ignorant blacksmiths you cannot do better than rely on the rather exaggerated instructions contained in Miles on the Horse’s Foot, issued at a low price by the Royal Agricultural Society. Good shoeing prolongs the use of a horse for years.

Horses under six years’ old are seldom equal to very hard work

Horses under six years’ old are seldom equal to very hard work

Horses under six years’ old are seldom equal to very hard work

Horses under six years’ old are seldom equal to very hard work: they are not, full-grown, of much use, where only one or two are kept.

Make a point of caressing your horse, and giving him a carrot or apple whenever he is brought to you, at the same time carefully examine him all over, see to his legs, his shoes, and feet; notice if he is well groomed; see to the condition of his furniture, and see always that he is properly bitted. Grooms are often careless and ignorant.

The qualifications of a hunter need not be described

The qualifications of a hunter need not be described

The qualifications of a hunter need not be described

The qualifications of a hunter need not be described, because all those who need these hints will, if they have common sense, only take hunters like servants, with established characters of at least one season.

Remember that a horse for driving requires courage, for he is always going fast he never walks. People who only keep one or two horses often make the same mistake, as if they engaged Lord Gourmet’s cook for a servant of all work. They see a fiery caprioling animal, sleek as a mole, gentle, but full of fire, come out of a nobleman’s stud, where he was nursed like a child, and only ridden or driven in his turn, with half-a-dozen others. Seduced by his lively appearance, they purchase him, and place him under the care of a gardener-groom, or at livery, work him every day, early and late, and are surprised to find his flesh melt, his coat lose its bloom, and his lively pace exchanged for a dull shamble. This is a common case. The wise course is to select for a horse of all work an animal that has been always accustomed to work hard; he will then improve with care and regular exercise.

Beside other well-known qualifications of beauty and pace

Beside other well-known qualifications of beauty and pace

Beside other well-known qualifications of beauty and pace

A lady’s horse, beside other well-known qualifications of beauty and pace, should be up to the lady’s weight. It is one of the fictions of society that all ladies eat little and weigh little. Now, a saddle and habit weigh nearly three stone, a very slim lady will weigh nine, so there you reach twelve stone, which, considering how fond young girls are of riding fast and long over hard roads, is no mean weight. The best plan is to put the dear creatures into the scales with their saddles, register the result, and choose a horse calculated to be a good stone over the gross weight. How few ladies remember, as for hours they canter up and down Rotten Row, that that famous promenade is a mile and a quarter in length, so ten turns make twelve miles and a half.

Any well-bred screw can gallop

Any well-bred screw can gallop

Any well-bred screw can gallop

Teach your hack to walk well with the reins loose no pace is more gentlemanly and useful than a good steady walk. Any well-bred screw can gallop; it is the slow paces that show a gentleman’s hack.

If on a long journey, walk a quarter of a mile for every four you trot or canter, choosing the softest bits of road or turf.

Do not permit the saddle to be removed for at least half an hour after arriving with your horse hot. A neglect of this precaution will give a sore back.

A town hack should be good-looking

A town hack should be good-looking

A town hack should be good-looking

Hacks for long distances are seldom required in England in these railway days. A town hack should be good-looking, sure-footed, not too tall, and active, for you are always in sight, you have to ride over slippery pavement, to turn sharp corners, and to mount and dismount often. Rarey’s system of making the horse obey the voice, stand until called, and follow the rider, may easily be taught, and is of great practical value thus applied. A cover or country hack must be fast, but need not be so showy in action or handsome as a town hack his merit is to get over the ground.

Not as long as he faces the object

Not as long as he faces the object

Not as long as he faces the object

If you can distinctly ascertain that a horse shies and turns round from mere skittishness, correct him when he turns, not as long as he faces the object: he will soon learn that it is for turning that he is visited with whip and spurs. A few days’ practice and patience essentially alter the character of the most nervous horses.

Books contain very elaborate descriptions of what a hack or a hunter should be in form, &c. To most persons these descriptions convey no practical ideas. The better plan is to take lessons on the proportions and anatomy of a horse from some intelligent judge or veterinary surgeon. You must study, and buy, and lose your money on many horses before you can safely, if ever, depend on your own judgment in choosing a horse. And, after all, a natural talent for comparison and eye for proportion are only the gift of a few. Some men have horses all their lives, and yet scarcely know a good animal from a bad one, although they may know what they like to drive, or ride or hunt. The safe plan is to distrust your own judgment until you feel you have had experience enough to choose for yourself.

Which is often increased by brutality

Which is often increased by brutality

Which is often increased by brutality

Nervousness, which is often increased by brutality, as the horse is not only afraid of the object, but of the whipping and spurring he has been accustomed to receive, can be alleviated, to some extent, by the treatment already described in the horse-training chapter. But horses first brought from the country to a large town are likely to be alarmed at a number of objects. You must take time to make them acquainted with each. For instance, I brought a mare from the country that everything moving seemed to frighten. I am convinced she had been ill-used, or had had an accident in harness. The first time a railway train passed in her sight over a bridge spanning the road she was travelling, she would turn round and would have run away had I not been able to restrain her; I could feel her heart beat between my legs. Acting on the principles of Xenophon and Mr. Rarey, I allowed her to turn, but compelled her to stand, twenty yards off, while the train passed. She looked back with a fearful eye all the time it was a very slow luggage train while I soothed her. After once or twice she consented to face the train, watching it with crested neck and ears erect; by degrees she walked slowly forwards, and in the course of a few days passed under the bridge in the midst of the thunder of a train with perfect indifference.

Shying arises from three causes defective eyesight

Shying arises from three causes defective eyesight

Shying arises from three causes defective eyesight

There is nothing that requires more patience and firmness than a shying horse. Shying arises from three causes defective eyesight, skittishness, and fear. If a horse always shies from the same side you may be sure the eye on that side is defective.

You may know that a horse shies from skittishness if he flies one day snorting from what he meets the next with indifference; dark stables also produce this irregular shying.

There is a good deal taught in the best military schools

There is a good deal taught in the best military schools

There is a good deal taught in the best military schools

There is a good deal taught in the best military schools, well worth time and study, which, with practice in horse-taming, would fill up the idle time of that numerous class who never read, and find time heavy on their hands, when out of town life.

But a military riding-school, says Colonel Greenwood, is too apt to teach you to sit on your horse as stiff as a statue, to let your right hand hang down as useless as if God had never gifted you with one, to stick your left hand out, with a stiff straight wrist like a boltsprit, and to turn your horse invariably on the wrong rein. I should not venture to say so much on my own authority, but Captain Nolan says further, speaking of the effect of the foreign school (not Baucher’s), on horses and men, The result of this long monotonous course of study is, that on the uninitiated the school rider makes a pleasing impression, his horse turns, prances, and caracoles without any visible aid, or without any motion in the horseman’s upright, imposing attitude. But I have lived and served with them. I have myself been a riding-master, and know, from experience, the disadvantages of this foreign seat and system.

The riding-school is a bad place to teach a horse to leap

The riding-school is a bad place to teach a horse to leap

The riding-school is a bad place to teach a horse to leap

Leaping. The riding-school is a bad place to teach a horse to leap. The bar, with its posts, is very apt to frighten him; if a colt has not been trained to leap as it should be by following its dam before it is mounted, take it into the fields and let it follow well-trained horses over easy low fences and little ditches, slowly without fuss, and, as part of the ride, not backwards and forwards always leap on the snaffle. Our cavalry officers learn to leap, not in the school, but across country. Nolan tells a story that, during some manœuvres in Italy, an Austrian general, with his staff, got amongst some enclosures and sent some of his aide-de-camps to find an outlet. They peered over the stone walls, rode about, but could find no gap. The general turned to one of his staff, a Yorkshireman, and said, See if you can find a way out of this place. Mr. W k, mounted on a good English horse, went straight at the wall, cleared it, and, while doing so, turned in his saddle and touched his cap and said, This way, general; but his way did not suit the rest of the party.

With the hand well up and close under the horse’s gullet

With the hand well up and close under the horse’s gullet

With the hand well up and close under the horse’s gullet

Rearing. Knot the snaffle rein loose it when the horse rears put your right arm round the horse’s neck, with the hand well up and close under the horse’s gullet; press your left shoulder forward so as to bring your chest to the horse’s near side, for, if the horse falls, you will fall clear; the moment he is descending, press him forward, take up the rein, which, being knotted, is short to your hands, and ply the spurs. But a horse, after being laid down and made walk, tied up like the zebra a few times, will seldom persist, because the moment he attempts to rise you pull his off hind leg under him and he is powerless.

The same rules should be observed for making

The same rules should be observed for making

The same rules should be observed for making

The same rules should be observed for making a horse canter with the right leg, but the right rein should be only drawn enough to develop his right nostril.

Reining Back. You must collect a horse with your legs before you rein him back, because if you press him back first with the reins he may throw all his weight on his hind legs under him, stick out his nose, hug his tail, and then he cannot stir you must recover him to his balance, and give him power to step back. This rule is often neglected by carters in trying to make the shaft-horse back.

Without being retained by the hands and urged by the legs

Without being retained by the hands and urged by the legs

Without being retained by the hands and urged by the legs

A horse should never be turned without being made to collect himself, without being retained by the hands and urged by the legs, as well as guided by both; that is, in turning to the right both hands should retain him, and the right hand guide him, by being used the strongest; in turning to the left, both legs should urge him, and the left guide him by being pressed the strongest. Don’t turn into the contrary extreme, slackening the left rein, and hauling the horse’s head round to the right.

You cannot take too much pains to acquire this art

You cannot take too much pains to acquire this art

You cannot take too much pains to acquire this art

You cannot take too much pains to acquire this art, for although it is not exercised on an old hack, that you ride with reins held any how, and your legs dangling anywhere, it is called into action and gives additional enjoyment to be striding the finest class of high-couraged delicate-mouthed horses beautiful creatures that seem to enjoy being ridden by a real horseman or light-handed Amazone, but which become frantic in ignorant or brutal hands.

By a judicious use of the curb rein

By a judicious use of the curb rein

By a judicious use of the curb rein

By a judicious use of the curb rein, you collect a tired horse; tired horses are inclined to sprawl about. You draw his hind-legs under him, throw him upon his haunches, and render him less liable to fall even on his weary or weak fore-legs. But a pull at the reins when a horse is falling may make him hold up his head, but cannot make him hold up his legs.

When a horse is in movement there should be a constant touch or feeling or play between his mouth and the rider’s hands. Not the hold by which riders of the foreign school retain their horses at an artificial parade pace, which is inconceivably fatiguing to the animal, and quite contrary to our English notions of natural riding; but a gradual, delicate firm feeling of the mouth and steady indications of the legs, which keep a fiery well-broken horse always, to use a school phrase, between your hands and legs.

Plunging or attempting to run away

Plunging or attempting to run away

Plunging or attempting to run away

The pupil horseman should remember to drop his hands as low as he can on each side the withers, without stooping, when a horse becomes restive, plunging or attempting to run away. The instinct of a novice is to do exactly what he ought not to do raise his hands.

By a skilful use of the reins and your own legs, with or without spurs, you collect, or, as Colonel Greenwood well expresses it, you condense your horse, at a stand, that is, you make him stand square, yet ready to move in any direction at any pace that you require; this is one use of the curb bit. It is on the same principle that fashionable coachmen hit and hold their high-bred horses while they thread the crowded streets of the West end in season, or that you see a hard rider, when starting with three hundred companions at the joyful sound of Tally-ho, pricking and holding his horse, to have him ready for a great effort the moment he is clear of the crowd.

A good horseman chooses his horse’s ground and his pace for him

A good horseman chooses his horse’s ground and his pace for him

A good horseman chooses his horse’s ground and his pace for him

A good horseman chooses his horse’s ground and his pace for him. To avoid a falling leaf a horse will put his foot over a precipice. When a horse has made a stumble, or is in difficulties at a fence, you cannot leave him too much at liberty, or be too quiet with him. Don’t believe the nonsense people talk about holding a horse up after he has stumbled.