120 THE ART OF TAMING HORSES. 



without any girths at all . If you are not tall enough to 

 put your foot fairly in the stirrup, use a horse-block, or, 

 better still, a piece of solid wood ahout eighteen inches 

 high, that can be moved about anywhere. 



Young men should learn to leap into the saddle by 

 placing both hands on the cantle, as the horse moves. 

 I have seen Daly, the steeplechaser, who was a little 

 man, do this often in the hunting-field, before he broke 

 his thigh. 



With respect to the best model for a seat, I recom- 

 mend the very large class who form the best customers 

 of riding-school masters in the great towns of England, 

 I mean the gentlemen from eighteen to eight-and- 

 twenty, who begin to ride as soon as they have the 

 means and the opportunity, to study the style of the 

 first-class steeplechase jockeys and gentlemen riders 

 in the hunting-field whenever they have the opportunity. 

 Almost all riding-masters are old dragoons, and what 

 they teach is good as far as it goes, as to general appear- 

 ance and carriage of the body, but generally the military 

 notions about the use of a rider's arms and legs are 

 utterly wrong. 



On this point we cannot have a better authority th,n 

 that of the late Captain Nolan, who served in the Aus- 

 trian, Hungarian, and in the English cavalry in India, 

 and who studied horsemanship in Kussia, and all other 

 European countries celebrated for their cavalry. He 

 says 



" The difference between a school (viz. an ordinary 

 military horseman) and a real horseman is this, the 

 first depends upon guiding and managing his horse 

 for maintaining his seat; the second depends upon his 

 seat for controlling and guiding his horse. At a trot 

 the school rider, instead of lightly rising to the action 



