62 DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 



of furze fastened against the partition or post will sometimes effect a 

 cure. When tlie horse finds that he is pretty severely pricked, he will 

 not long continue to punish himself. In confirmed cases it may be 

 necessary to have recourse to the log, but the legs are often not a little 

 bruised by it. x\ rather long and heavy piece of wood attached to a 

 chain has been buckled above the hock, so as to reach about half-way 

 down the leg. When the horse attempts to kick violently, his leg will 

 receive a severe blow : this, and the repetition of it may, after a time, 

 teach him to be quiet. 



A much more serious vice is kicking in harness. From the least 

 annoyance about the rump or quarters, some horses will kick at a most 

 violent rate, and destroy the bottom of the chaise, and endanger the 

 limbs of the driver. 'J hose that are fidgety in the stable are most apt 

 to do this. If the reins should perchance get under the tail, the vio- 

 lence of the kicker will often be most outrageous ; and while the animal 

 presses down his tail so tightly that it is almost impossible to extricate 

 the reins, he continues to plunge until he has demolished every thing 

 behind him. 



This is a vice standing foremost in point of danger, and which no 

 treatment will always conquer. It will be altogether in vain to try 

 coercion. If the shafts are very strong and without flaw, or if they are 

 plated with iron underneath, and a stout kicking strap resorted to 

 w^hich will barely allow the horse the proper use of his hind limbs in 

 progression, but not permit him to raise them sufficiently for the purpose 

 of kicking, he may be prevented from doing mischief; or, if he is har- 

 nessed to a heavy cart, and thus confined, his eff"orts to lash out will be 

 restrained : but it is frequently a very unpleasant thing to witness these 

 attempt, though ineff"ectual, to demolish the vehicle, for the shafts or 

 the kicking-strap may possibly break, and extreme danger may ensue. 

 A horse that has once begun to kick, whatever may have been the 

 original cause of it, can never be depended upon again, and he will be 

 very unwise who ventures behind him. The man, however, who must 

 come within reach of a kicker should come as close to him as possible. 

 The blow may thus become a push, and seldom is injurious.* 



Unsteadiness while being Mounted. — When this merely amounts to eager- 

 ness to start — very unpleasant, indeed, at times, for many a rider has been 

 thrown from his seat before he was fairly fixed in it — it may be remedied 

 by an active and good horseman. We have known many instances in 

 which, while the elderly, and inactive and fearful man has been making 

 more than one ineflectual attempt to vault into the saddle, the horse 

 has been dancing about to his annoyance and danger; but the. animal 

 had no sooner been transferred to the nianagement of a younger and 

 more agile rider than he became perfectly subdued. Severity will here, 

 more decidedly than in any other case, do harm. The rider should be 

 fearless — he should carelessly and confidently approach the horse, 

 mount at the first efi'ort, and then restrain him for a while ; patting him, 

 and not .sufiering him to proceed until he becomes perfectly quiet. 



* See Earey's Method of correcting this aud other vices, at page 35. 



