SCHOOL RIDING. 263 



That being the case, we should allow the horse to resume 

 his natural attitude or gait (permitting him to " stand at 

 ease " or " march at ease ") after performing any of his 

 school tasks, none of which should be prolonged to such an 

 extent as to tire him. I shall consider, in Chapter X., the 

 relations of school breaking to military riding. 



In order that the school horse may be maintained 

 absolutely under the control of his rider, we should avoid 

 giving him set tasks of an unvaried nature ; we should not 

 commence, stop, or alter the work at particular places ; and 

 we should not aUow him to act for himself, without receiving 

 a signal from his rider, so that he may not become routin/. 

 As a case in point, we should on no account, when teaching 

 a horse to strike off correctly in the canter, always begin 

 at one spot, whether on a circle or in a straight line ; for 

 if we do so, the animal will look out for his arrival at that 

 point, to start off of his own accord, and thus, by taking 

 the initiative, to deprive us of command over him. We 

 here touch on a weak point of school breaking, namely, 

 that a horse whose instruction is confined to the manege, 

 becomes routine to the school, so that he will perform his 

 work properly only in it, and would require, in order to 

 fit him to act outside, a further (though, necessarily, a 

 much shorter) course of teaching, which would have the 

 effect of more or less impairing his cleverness indoors. 

 Hence, high-school horses are, as a rule, exercised only in 

 the manege. I have seen this tendency to become routing 

 to a certain place well shown by horses which I practised 

 at various school airs on a particular part of my paddock ; 

 for although they would do this work with precision and 

 brilliancy on the improvised manege, they would, until I 

 had accustomed them to the change, try to " play up " the 

 moment I took them off the well-remembered track. 

 Therefore, school breaking, however valuable it may be, 



