SEATS. 69 



legs with the horse's body; the wash-ball seat goes 

 further, and abjures balance. In Chapter II., when 

 speaking of the position of the stirrup in the saddle, 

 we could only give some of the reasons why this should 

 be central. "We have now arrived at a point that ren- 

 ders it possible to give the remaining ones, which are 

 of no less importance. They are these : The interior 

 surfaces of a tolerably well-built man's thighs and legs, 

 from the fork to the heels, are curved in concave or hol- 

 low sweeps, that may be varied from the knee downwards 

 by turning the toes more or less outwards ; * and if we 

 look at a horse from the rear, it will be very evident 

 that his midship section that is to say, the lines we 

 should see if the animal were chopped fairly in two right 

 through his fourteenth vertebra coincides very accurate- 

 ly with the sweep of the rider's legs. At top, no doubt, 

 the figure is natter than the man's fork, but the ridge of 

 the saddle fills up the empty space to a certain extent : 

 besides which, no good rider sits in his fork, but on his 

 seat. Further, although the horse's body is rounded 

 away under the belly, the possibility of varying the 

 curve of the leg from the knee downwards enables 

 the rider to preserve contact very low down : he can 

 encircle his horse nearly two -thirds when sitting on 

 this line. 



If, on the contrary, the stirrup- be placed too far for- 

 ward, the thigh runs diagonally forwards toward the 

 horse's shoulder. Now let us look at the horse from the 

 front, standing exactly opposite to his forehead. We see 

 at once that the animal's body, besides being narrower 



* It is therefore very absurd to insist on any specific measure 

 for this. Even a round-thighed man may get up a hollow curve by 

 turning out his toes a little in excess. 



