opening a Gate. 85 



be of any service at all. Have you never seen a 

 man who was trying to open a gate at which a 

 score of impatient, not to say objurgatory, riders 

 were waiting, while the field was disappearing 

 over the hills and far away, and who could neither 

 get at it nor out of the way, because his crack 

 hunter did n't know what the pressure of his mas- 

 ter's legs meant, and fought shy of the gate, while 

 keeping others from coming near it? Have you 

 never stood watching a race at the Country Club, 

 with a rider beside you whose horse took up five 

 times the space he was entitled to, because he 

 could not be made to move sidewise ? Has not 

 every one seen occasions when even a little train- 

 ing would have been a boon both to himself and 

 his neighbors ? 



Talking of opening gates, one of the best bits 

 of practice is to unlock, open, and ride through a 

 common door and close and lock it after you 

 without dismounting. Let it be a door opening 

 towards you. If your horse will quickly get into 

 and stand steady in the positions necessary to en- 

 able you to lean over and do all this handily at 

 any door, gates will cease to have any terrors for 

 you. 



Nor must you suppose that every schooled 

 horse is of necessity kept in his most skilled form 

 at all times. As few college graduates of twenty 

 years' standing can construe an ode of Horace, 



