THE USE OF THE BRIDLE. 37 



contracting his stride, or by fighting with the restriction, 

 wasting any of his gallop in the air. It answers its pur- 

 pose admirably so long as it remains in the proper place \ 

 but not a moment longer. Directly a horse by sticking 

 out his nose can shift this pressure to his lips and teeth, 

 it affords no more control than a halter. ; With head up, 

 and mouth open, he can go how and where he will. In 

 such a predicament only an experienced horseman has 

 the skill to give him such an amount of liberty without 

 license as cajoles him into dropping again to his 

 bridle, before he breaks away. Once off at speed, 

 with the conviction that he is master, however 

 ludicrous in appearance, the affair is serious enough 

 in fact. 



^Many centuries elapsed, and a good deal of un- 

 pleasant riding must have been endured, before the 

 snaffle was supplemented with a martingale. Judging 

 from the Elgin Marbles, this useful invention seems to 

 have been wholly unknown to the Greeks. Though the 

 men's figures are perfect in seat and attitude through 

 the whole of that spirited frieze which adorned the 

 Parthenon, not one of their horses carries its head in 

 the right place. The ancient Greek seems . to have 

 relied on strength rather than cunning, in his dealings 

 with the noble animal, and though he sat down on it 



