ROAD-RIDINa 



The road-rider, although not required to take fences, or permitted to ride 

 at full gallop like the hunter, has his own difficulties to contend with : he 

 has to do his work on a hard, inelastic surface, and not on grass fields or 

 ploughed land ; he must be prepared to make sharp turns, and to meet all 

 sorts of provocations to shying and restiveness, of which the hunting-man 

 knows little or nothing ; in fact, handiness, safety for himself, and a due 

 regard for his horse's legs, are much more important considerations for him 

 than great speed. 



Let us take the hard road, in the first instance, into consideration. 

 When one body strikes, falls, or impinges on another, to use a scientific 

 phrase, it receives the blow back sooner or later. This is, as we all know, 

 what is called recoil or rebound ; the elastic surface gives back the blow 

 later and more gradually ; the inelastic one sooner, and more suddenly. The 

 horse's leg being elastic, it receives but a small shock from the elastic turf, 

 this being divided between both nearly equally ; on the hard road nearly the 

 whole recoil is transmitted back to the horse's body through its limbs, and 

 this is nearly equal to the weight of both rider and bearer. There are 

 various means by which this recoil may be diminished in intensity, to the 

 great ease of the horse. One of the most obvious is to distribute the weight 

 as nearly as possible over the middle of the horse's back, which is con- 

 structed, as we have shown, in such a manner as to admit of a certain amount 

 of elastic action in a vertical direction — in plain words, up and down. 



Two men can carry a greater weight with an elastic pole on their shoulders 

 than with a stiff one ; and if the burden be not exactly in the centre of 

 it, the man to whom it is nearest will get more of the recoil from the 

 ground than the other one. Now, taking into account that the road-rider 

 does not want great speed, and has at the same time an inelastic surface to 

 deal with, there can, we think, be little doubt that, by placing his saddle and 



