220 HANDS AND LEGS (AIDS). 



when handling the reins, and which an ordinary member of a 

 fashionable hunt could rarely use with propriety for its 

 legitimate purpose of bringing up straggling hounds and 

 other work that would come within the province of the 

 whippers-in and huntsman. Such aid might at times be ap- 

 propriately rendered at that undress function, cub-hunting, 

 and with small provincial packs that are not well supplied 

 with hunt servants. In ordinary cases, the only use of 

 the thong is for the end of it to be wrapped round the 

 rider's hand, when he is opening a gate, so that he may 

 not drop the whip by accident. It serves however as a 

 useful warning to hounds to keep away from an uncertain 

 tempered horse, when held out with the thong hanging 

 down and well away from the animal's sides. A hunter 

 that is likely to lash out at hounds should not be taken 

 near them, but there are times when such dangerous 

 proximity is unavoidable, and the hunting crop with thong 

 extended will prove of great value in avoiding an accident. 



The way sanctioned by custom for carrying a hunting crop, 

 is that of holding it with the loop up (Fig. 191). When the 

 rider does not want to use the thong, he coils the slack of it 

 round the palm of the right hand, beginning at the lash, and 

 then grasps the crop. If he wants to be ready to crack the 

 whip, he may hold the lash in the right hand ; or may leave 

 the thong hanging down. In cracking a hunting whip on 

 horseback, the rider should make his upward and downward 

 cuts in a vertical plane, parallel to and a little away from 

 the side of the animal, so that he may not accidentally hit 

 him. 



There are two principal varieties of the cutting whip : one, 

 the usual old-fashioned pattern, which tapers gradually off 

 from the butt, and which has a leather-covered handle 

 placed between two mounts that are, as a rule, silver plated. 

 The other, which has a projecting butt specially made to 



