NECESSITY OF HORSE CONTROL. 3 



Custance was an instance of a jockey of the highest 

 class being a particularly fine rider to hounds, and always 

 hunted with the Cottesmore. Marsh, the King's trainer, 

 Ryan, Jewitt and French were also fine horsemen over a 

 country. Even the best steeplechase riders are not always 

 first-flight men out hunting. Few Australian jockeys are 

 good on a buck-jumper. Hunting, chasing, and flat- race 

 riding are by no means sufficient to teach a man how to 

 ride at polo. In all these forms of horsemanship, special 

 practice alone makes perfect. 



As a rule, the weak point in the riding of hunting men 

 and jockeys is want of knowledge in the application of 

 hands and legs for keeping a horse under control and 

 for making him obey with promptness and precision every 

 legitimate command of the man on his back. Under the 

 head of " legitimate commands," we may include all that 

 ought to be taught in our military riding schools, as well 

 as the usual details of ordinary horsemanship. It is evident 

 that ability to make a horse rein back, " passage," 

 change the leading leg at the canter or gallop, turn and 

 change from one pace into another with promptness and 

 precision, is useful in every form of riding. Many a man 

 out hunting would have been saved from a nasty kick, 

 and in some cases from a broken leg, when too close 

 behind a tail adorned with a red bow, if he had only 

 known how to rein back ; and from being thrown out of 

 a run by losing time when trying to open a gate, if he 

 had been able to have made his animal turn on its fore- 

 hand. Jockeys frequently lose a good place at the start, 

 from not being able to move to the rear or to one 

 side, without having to turn their horses round. Horses 

 have of course to be taught how to execute these very 

 useful and easily-learned movements, before they can do 

 them properly in obedience to the indications of the hand 



