OF HORSEMANSHIP. 79 



fo much merit with thofc who loved their cafe, yet, if 

 we may judge from the fame fort of witnefTes, the an- 

 cient equeftrian ftatues, fome of them will convince 

 us, by the attitude in which the horfes are placed, 

 that the trot was not wholly difregarded. The ftatue 

 of Marcus Aurelius in bronze, a bas relief of the fame 

 emperor, and the horfes of Titus upon the arch which 

 bears his name, are all reprefented in the action of the 

 trot. Thefe are the remarks of the late learned Abbe 

 Winkelman : he fays, " that notwithftanding the 

 " authorities above cited of ftatues of liorfes in the 

 " aiflion of the amble, that it was a manner of going 

 *' which the ancients did permit, and oppofes to them 

 *' feveral horfes reprefented in the trot.'* In doing 

 this, however, he only confronts ftatue with ftatue, 

 and the fcales hang even. Befides, as a French author 

 obferves, the ancient ilatues are not always to be irufled; 

 and the artifts were fo ignorant and inaccurate in the 

 figures which they made of horfes, that they fre- 

 quently deformed and mifreprefented nature, and 

 violated all the rules of art. Nor is it impoffible that 

 their contemporary horfemen were better Ikilled ; and 

 indeed it cannot be fuppofed that they were, when 

 they permitted to fend forth fuch uncouth and grofs 

 reprefentations of horfes, as antiquity in many inftancea 

 furnilhes us with, in which all the fair proportions of 

 nature, the elegancies of form, and what the French 

 call belle nature are often facrificed to whim, conceit. 



and ignorance. 



With 



