254 Modern Riding and Horse Education 



assessing the necessary time are the character of 

 the trainer, the disposition of the horse, his age, and 

 his fitness for the work in hand. 



The personal element is the leading factor in 

 horse training. One of the best trainers I ever saw, 

 though he rode " well enough," was by no means a 

 fine horseman. Yet he had " a way with him," 

 and always seemed to follow the least line of resist- 

 ance by instinct; he was friends with a difficult 

 horse in a very short time and a " kind " one under- 

 stood him at once. 



There are many systems advocated for horse 

 training, yet none of these holds the field, which I 

 believe to be simply for the above reason, namely, 

 that the personal factor is supreme, and that as long 

 as the man has an intimate knowledge of horses 

 and what they should do and and be w^hen he has 

 finished with them, he will train them as perfectly 

 as circumstances permit on any system, modifying 

 his procedure to suit individual cases. 



English and American horses certainly have char- 

 acters, and the better they are bred the more marked 

 will these be. General Brocklehurst, master of the 

 Cottesmore hounds, writes to me that the best com- 



