TAILORS VERSUS GROOMS AS DRAGOONS. 53 



phrase) " a side of a coach by himself," and will twist 

 a loaded coach of three tons about, would probably be 

 tired to death carrying a very heavy man ; and vice 

 versd, a troop-horse that has carried perhaps 22st. or 

 23st. with apparent ease to himself, if bought for a 

 coach, is beat in a ten -mile stage. Like the miller and 

 the smith, they both had learned to do their own 

 work ; but, not knowing how to do the other's with 

 the most ease to themselves, it tires them. 



If I was -to purchase a horse to make a hunter for 

 an 18st. man, I would much prefer a horse that had 

 been very little hunted to one that had been some time 

 at it carrying a light weight ; and I should do so on 

 the same principle that a groom or a post-boy always 

 give more trouble in a riding-school than a tailor. In 

 the first place, they are conceited ; but, worse than 

 that (for the riding-school has taken the conceit out 

 of many a poor fellow), they have acquired a parti- 

 cular seat and mode of riding ; so they have not only 

 to learn a new one, but to be broke of the old one. 

 Now the tailor has no seat at all, excepting a cross- 

 legged one, and that he never practised on horseback ; 

 so one seat is as natural to him as another when on 

 a horse. God knows, the poor devil finds any un- 

 comfortable enough ; but he is willing to learn, and 

 having nothing to unlearn, he has the advantage of 

 the others, as their knowledge is against them. Snip 

 is equal if not superior to the others in another par- 

 ticular his stern is as hard as a rhinoceros's hide. 



But to return to the horse that has not and the one 

 that has been hunted. The first has probably ordinary 

 action in his walk and gallop : now put this horse into 

 a riding-school under a manege rider for three months, 

 or on the other hand put him in training and under a 



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