254 RESTIVENESS : ITS PREVENTION AND CURE. 



Should the horse, during this period of training, " try 

 on " his old tricks, the rider must be prepared for it, 

 watching its movements attentively, and especially all 

 slackening or cringing in its paces, which should be 

 promptly attacked, though not roughly. Acting merely 

 on the defensive is quite out of place in handling 

 vicious horses ; one must meet them boldly. One or 

 two promptly administered cuts of the whip over the 

 shoulders will frequently nip any renewed attempt at 

 rearing in the bud. With all restive horses, but more 

 especially with rearers, it is essential that the regular 

 seat should not be in the least disturbed by the neces- 

 sity for using either whip or spur. A seat that may 

 do admirably well for riding a willing horse over the 

 stiffest country in England, may be perfectly useless for 

 the sort of work described here. 



Horses that have become confirmed rearers, and fre- 

 quently thrown themselves back with the rider, will 

 require great caution, and must be handled in a some- 

 what more methodical manner, though still on the 

 same principle. We have shown what the horse does 

 when it is preparing to rear ; let us now for a moment 

 look at it in the act of rearing. After slinking away 

 from the rider's hand and seat, so that he loses all hold 

 of it, the animal suddenly stiffens its hocks, throwing 

 its whole weight on them, and at the same moment 

 stiffens also its neck, and especially the throat, some- 

 what in the position shown by the upper horse in fig. 7, 

 so that it becomes quite impossible to get a downward 

 pull at it, and thus defies the rider most completely. 

 It is always the same story stiffened hocks and a stiff 

 neck.* The safest way of managing confirmed rearers 

 * In the English method of handling horses little attention is paid 



