86 



THE HORSE IN MOTION. 



tion of the line of motion from the horizontal is least. Pre-eminent 

 among these are the horse and hound, whose mode of progression is 

 the same. Though the deer and hare may have the advantage for 

 a short run, yet the method of progression by bounds, used by these 

 animals, sooner fatigues them, and in a fair field they will be run down 

 by the former from sheer exhaustion. To this subject we shall refer 

 again when we analyze the paces of the deer and dog. 



In the two preceding chapters we have condensed the anatomy of 

 the locomotive organs into as small a space as possible, and at the 

 same time have, with the aid of accurate drawings, endeavored to 

 make the mechanical action of all the limbs individually so intelligible 

 that any one of ordinary information may comprehend them. We will 

 now proceed to show how these forces are co-ordinated in the produc- 

 tion of the different paces when all the limbs are in action. Instead 

 of the mingled confusion of limbs and display of brute force, one may 

 see the most perfect order and regularity. In the slow movements 

 the limbs of the horse are without doubt much under the control of 

 the will ; he may use his anterior ones to strike, paw the ground, and 

 in various ways show the control he has of different muscles in the 

 performance of their various functions ; he may rear and kick, toss his 

 head and lower it to the ground, as in drinking, grazing, or sauntering; 

 but when speeding, whether from ambition or terror, all this trifling is 

 laid aside, the position of the head becomes fixed as a base of action 

 for the muscles of the neck and head, the detailed action of the va- 

 rious parts of the animal are lost in the complicated machine, and 

 the whole acts automatically, as the movements of the various parts 

 of a locomotive are lost in the combined action of the engine to 

 which they are subordinate. 



The run is the perfect gait of the horse, for it is that which displays 

 most perfectly the play of all his locomotive organs, by which he at- 

 tains his greatest speed, and to which he owes his preservation in the 

 long struggle for existence through which he must have passed before 

 he came under the protecting care of man. It is the gait, therefore, 

 which best serves as a subject to study the law, or the theory of his 

 locomotion. To any one who has followed the anatomical analysis 



