38 THEORY OF HORSE-CONTROL. 



inflicting suffering on the horse only as a means of edu- 

 cation, but not as a penalty for wrong-doing, which is 

 a question of morality that does not concern him. In 

 breaking, the sole benefit to be derived from the infliction, 

 or from fear of pain, is to induce the animal to mentally 

 associate with it the particular idea which the breaker 

 wishes to convey, either as a stimulus or as a warning. 

 The horse, following his instinct of seeking safety from 

 danger by flight, tries, as a rule, to escape from threatened 

 or inflicted pain. Thus, the horse goes forward when we 

 raise the driving whip behind him, or touch him on the 

 quarters with it. If we threaten him with the whip in front, 

 he will usually recoil from it. I think we may take for 

 granted that if the horse yielded to instinct, uninfluenced 

 by previous training, he would, on being struck on the front 

 part of the body, be more inclined to go back than to go 

 forward. By association of ideas, however, we can teach 

 him to increase his pace almost as well by hitting him on 

 the shoulder as on the hind quarters. The latter method 

 is much to be preferred to the former, on account of its 

 being more in harmony with the animal's instinct. If 

 an irritating fly happens to pitch on the horse's side behind 

 the girths, he will instinctively try to dislodge it by 

 whisking it off with his tail, or, failing that, by kicking 

 at it. As we wish him to employ neither of these means on 

 being touched with the spur, we should teach him to regard 

 its application as an indication of our wishes, and not as a 

 cause of irritation. Pain as a warning may be illustrated 

 by the use of the wooden gag (see page 329), to make the 

 biter connect in his mind the idea of pain with the practice 

 of his pet vice, which he will forsake as soon as the sug- 

 gested thought becomes habitual to him. 



The chief practical reasons against the employment of 

 punishment in the breaking of horses are : that it is very 



