THE HORSE IN MOTION. lOI 



The camera has, under the direction of Mr. Stanford, been made to 

 analyze all the paces, and none has been discovered that answers to it ; 

 yet it is to this pace that the term " gallop " has been always applied. 



When, three or four years ago, the results of Mr. Stanford's experi- 

 ments with twelve cameras were distributed in art circles, the photo- 

 graphs sent met everywhere with surprise and incredulity, and in some 

 quarters with ridicule and burlesque. Such result ought to have been 

 expected. They were not understood, and the revelation was so an- 

 tagonistic to all received opinions from the earliest times, that one 

 could not help but laugh ; and that they do not understand them 

 now does not surprise us, for hippo-anatomy has been always taught 

 under the light of a false hypothesis. When we consider how little 

 the simple movements of the trot were understood by the most learned 

 of the teachers of animal motion, is it a matter of wonder that the 

 complicated mechanism of the run had been kept so profound a secret 

 in the open face of day from time immemorial ? 



A revelation so startling as that made by the camera carried results 

 too far-reaching and revolutionary to be at once accepted, though it 

 came direct from heaven. There is too much capital invested in 

 works of art all over the civilized world to permit the innovation 

 without protest, and ridicule is the cheapest argument that can be 

 employed in controversy, for it does not require truth for its founda- 

 tion, and but a low order of talent for its display. 



All artists know the value of the horse as a chef d'(£iivrc, and he 

 is made, next to the human figure, the first subject in elementary 

 studies in art ; but from what source have been derived all the models 

 of horses in motion } Who does not tire in looking over the monot- 

 onous repetition of outstretched legs, as if their bearers had been shot 

 from a cross-bow, and were moving at a mark without any agency of 

 their own, and when the slightest variation of that inflexible form 

 would spoil the pose and ruin a picture. We are told that the object 

 is to represent action. Would not that object be more readily attained 

 if some position were represented that is known to be true, instead of 

 one that is proved to be impossible .'' " But art must represent things 

 as they seem," says an objector. Those who think they see a horse in 



