34 RIDING 



soon as he sights the willows, not only pumps the animal, but 

 confirms his previous impression that there is something 

 dreadful in front of him. 



The best way with a faint-hearted one (unless there is a 

 bridge handy, which is far the easiest solution of the difficulty) 

 is to give him very little notice indeed, but to trot or canter at 

 the abyss in an indifferent manner, as who shall say, ' These 

 rivulets are hardly worth troubling ourselves about, but we may 

 as well pop over this one.' Occasionally a horse will jump 

 standing what he will neither trot nor gallop to, but this is 

 always an agonising effort for both parties to the transaction. 

 Of course, if the width of the water is such that it is really a 

 case of 'having it at speed or not at all,' the pull for bridge or 

 ford is the only resource, unless the horse is one of those few 

 and far between equine angels who can be trusted to go down 

 at the glittering streak with ears cocked and the muscles of his 

 back hardening under the saddle, till he throws what Daven- 

 port Bromley calls the ' entrancing parabola,' and, landing well 

 beyond danger of yielding banks, strides over the adjoining 

 meadow cracking his nostrils and rejoicing in his strength. 



The knack of MAKING a hunter, whether going fast or slow, 

 get every fence high or wide exactly in his stride is simply a 

 matter of hands ; but even men celebrated for their delicate 

 manipulation of horses' mouths accomplish the balance trick 

 better on an animal they have ridden two or three times than 

 on one to whose stride they are unaccustomed. 



Of ' Doubles ' there are several sorts, and their negotiation 

 must be attempted according to their species. The first, the 

 most inhuman, and luckily the rarest, is the double pure and 

 simple, a stake-and-bound hedge with a ditch on each side, 

 such as exists or did exist with unpleasant frequency in the 

 Brixworth Vale. Getting over such a fence as this is pretty 

 much a question of scope l in the horse, and pluck in horse and 



1 Every horseman knows what is meant by the expression ' scope,' though it 

 is not easy of exact definition. ' Length everywhere, except in the back,' is 

 the best, though not altogether an ample, rendering. 



