OBJECTS OBTAINED BY DIRECT FLEXION. 53 



a bad voluntary distribution of the forces in an animal which 

 holds himself back and which does not wish to advance ; and 

 his hocks do not do their work of pushing" the mass forward. 

 If we overload the forehand by lowering the neck, we add 

 still more to the weight, and consequently we increase the 

 difficulty of the work required from the hocks.* We must 

 therefore raise the neck in order to lighten the forehand ; but 

 we should raise it from below upwards, and not from front to 

 rear, while taking care not to exaggerate the movement and 

 to keep the hand very light. A high position of the neck is 

 the first condition of good equilibrium, and having obtained 

 it, we should seek to give freedom to the hind quarters, while 

 bringing them into action, and making the horse go freely 

 forward, which we do by the flexions of the well-placed head, 

 by the loosening of the jaw, and especially by the legs. A 

 horse which is heavy in his hind quarters is behind his bit, 

 and if he does not wish to go forward, he is behind the 

 legs. With such an animal we must employ great lightness 

 of hand and great energy of the legs, so as to change his 

 distribution of weight by making him go up to his bit.f We 

 cannot obtain this result by a low position of the neck, which 

 is the chief obstacle to lightness. 



2. To fix the neck in the axis of the body by connecting to the 

 shoulders the head rendered light by flexion. The unbent head 

 is heavy at the end of the neck, which has become too 

 movable. Hence the proverb, " Heavy head, slack neck." 

 This is a case similar to that of holding a fishing-rod b)- its 

 thin end. The flexed head, on the contrary, moves with 

 lightness on the high neck, which is kept without stiff'ness on 

 the axis of the body by the sole action of the good 



* Without taking into consideration that a depressed position of the neck will 

 give only more spring to the act of rearing. 



f In such cases the driving whip, which obliges the horse to go forward, is a 

 good preparation for the use of the legs. 



