HOW TO TRAIN A COLT. 173 



forth. This principle being borne in mind by the 

 trainer, if he be a man of judgment, will supply him 

 with a good guide in his educational efforts. If the 

 whip is ever used, — and I think it can be with profit at 

 times, — let the blow be sudden and sharp, and rarely 

 repeated. Beating and pummelling a colt never does 

 good, and rarely, if ever, fails to work lasting mischief 

 One of the meanest tricks that a colt can fall into is that 

 of running backwards, which the English call "jibbing." 

 Your colt is harnessed, and safely led out of the car- 

 riage-house or yard. You mount the seat, and tell him 

 to go ahead. This he refuses to do. He looks round at 

 you with deliberate wilfulness in his eye, as much as to 

 say, " I rather think I shall do about as I'm a mind to in 

 this business." You lift the whip from the socket, tap 

 him gently over the rump, and tell him to go ahead. 

 Instead of this, he begins to go backward. I have seen 

 a man work two hours in a vain endeavor to make his 

 colt go forward. The colt was by no means vicious ; 

 and this habit of running backward, or jibbing, was the 

 only bad one that he had. But this threatened to mar, 

 if not utterly thwart, the trainer's endeavor. Day after 

 day, the colt was tried. He was pulled forward by 

 main strength; the whip was used judiciously; he was 

 coaxed ; he was threatened : but it was literally no go. 

 At last the trainer harnessed him into a common road- 

 sulky, and led him out into a large field free from all 

 obstruction ; and placing himself behind the sulky, with 

 the reins held tightly in his hands, he gave the signal 



