SEATS. 79 



his stirrups, to depend for seat to any extent on his reins. 

 Why this should be neglected in hunting is not easy 

 to understand. The Cossacks and Circassians, who all 

 ride with a snaffle, and do wonderful things with it, sit 

 perfectly independent of the rein : any one can make 

 his horse equally light in the hand with a snaffle as 

 theirs are, by making his seat as independent of the 

 reins and stirrups, or use a curbed bit in hunting if he 

 pleases. It is the close steady seat that makes the 

 hand light and the horse's mouth soft; and therefore it 

 is much more valuable in teaching to make the young 

 riders dispense altogether with the reins than with the 

 stirrups, and may be done sooner. 



Apropos of rising in the stirrups, " either to avoid 

 a kick, or in jumping a large fence, the rider, by merely 

 rising in his stirrups, at once raises or abstracts from 

 the saddle the point his enemy intends to attack, and 

 accordingly the blow aimed at it fails to reach it." * On 

 the contrary, Mr Apperley says, " When hounds find 

 and go away, place yourself well down in your saddle, 

 on your fork or twist, and don't be standing up in your 

 stirrups (as formerly was the fashion, and the cause of 

 many a dislocated neck), sticking out your rump as if 

 it did not belong to you." Who shall decide when 

 such high authorities differ ? But perhaps the differ- 

 ence is more specious than real. Mr Apperley says, 

 well down in your saddle, which we take it will bring 

 a man very near to the middle of that piece of furni- 

 ture, and probably to the horse's centre of motion. 

 Here the necessity for avoiding the blow does not arise, 

 it is the point of least motion ; but if a man sits well 

 lack in his saddle, a la wash-ball, he gets much nearer 

 * Sir F. Head, as above. 



