WHAT SCHOOLING WILL DO FOR A HORSE. 25 



take the lead in the gallop with that side ; that the 

 barbarous plan of placing a sharp spike in the 

 mouth-piece of the bit of a horse that pulls on one 

 side is advisable ; that the toes of the rider should 

 be turned out, which would take the flat of his 

 knees away from the saddle, etc. etc. The know- 

 ledge exhibited in the editorial columns of TJie 

 Field, and in the reviews of works on riding, is 

 often in keeping with the extracts I have already 

 made from its first page. One leading article, 

 I remember, spoke of horses that poked their noses 

 to the ground, ' like pigs hunting truffles,' or that 

 held up their noses like ' star-gazers,' as if it were 

 not bad riding that induced such carriage, for in a 

 state of nature no horses so bear themselves ; 

 and I have more than once seen pirouetting and 

 traversing decried as circus-tricks, while the im- 

 portance of changing the lead in the gallop was 

 admitted, when any horseman knows that to teach 

 the horse to bend the croup to make the changes 

 in the gallop, the animal must be trained in the 

 pirouettes and traversing. This paper has fre- 

 quently recommended that the martingale should 

 be put on the curb-reins, in which suggestion we 

 have proof of complete ignorance of the mechanical 

 action of the curb- bit, for the effect of the lever 

 would be destroyed by the interposition of the 



