AGRICULTURE. 225 



ino- is to put a saddle on liim. It is fastened well, the blind is 

 raised, and the full length of the rope given to him. He does 

 not understand the saddle. It may be a carnivorous beast for 

 all he knows. He is terrified at it. He jumps, and snorts, and 

 kicks, rears and pitches, throws himself down, worries himself 

 out, and falls into an agony of despair. After an hour or so 

 of such work, the vaquero advances again, puts down the 

 blind, and the horse stands trembling with fear and exhaus- 

 tion. He is now to be ridden. The rope is fastened under the 

 chin, so that it can be used for a bridle-rein ; the horse's ears 

 are pushed down under the upper part of the jaquima, so that 

 he shall be deaf as well as blind; the saddle-girth is tightened, 

 and the rider mounts. Over the saddle he has a second girth, 

 which is loose enough to allow him to get the point of his knee, 

 bent at right angles, under it. This girth ties him upon the horse. 

 The more he presses the knee outward, the tighter the girth 

 holds him ; whereas by turning his knees inward and straight- 

 ening his legs, he can be free in an instant. Having put his 

 knees under the girth (he does not care for the stirrups and 

 cannot use them) he reaches forward, takes the ears out from 

 under the jaquima, and raises the blind. The horse, as soon as 

 he sees the man on his back, is stricken with a new terror. He 

 immediately commences to jump stiff-legged. He springs up 

 into the air and comes down on his fore-feet with his legs stiff. 

 This is the way in which horses try to shake off panthers, and 

 they resort to the same method with men. The shock would 

 be severe if the man were not tied down to the saddle, but he 

 moves with the horse and is not hurt with the shock. Some- 

 times a horse will jump thus for hour after hour, and the rider 

 is very well satisfied, for there is no danger in the jumping, and 

 it is very tiresome to the animal. Some horses, after jumping 

 for a few minutes, will commence to run. To this the rider 

 makes no opposition, but practises the horse with the reins to 

 accustom him to guidance. The most dangerous horses are 

 those which rear up and fall backward. In such case the 

 vaquero must be ready to throw off the girth from his knees, 

 10* 



