USE OF THE WHIP. 3?g 



plainer English, they were so accustomed to be urged on 

 by the driver that, after having been a year or two at 

 work, they would not exert their powers until called upon 

 to do so. At the time I am alluding to, no sooner was 

 a coachman on his box and had started his coach, than 

 he began to show off to his passengers, by a display of 

 neat strokes with his whip, whether his horses required 

 punishing or not. I am ready to admit that some of 

 these old hands exhibited great execution in this part of 

 their profession, and that, from the comparatively little 

 use that has been lately made of it, the expert manage- 

 ment of the whip is now rarely to be met with. Amongst 

 London coachmen I have most particularly noticed a 

 deficiency here. I could name a score who are excellent 

 performers as far as the finger goes, but when they come 

 to hit a near-side leader, the blow falls powerless, and 

 brings to one's mind the old joke of the flea biting the 

 lobster. 



There are as many ways of whipping coach horses as 

 there are horses in the coach ; and, as there is a right and 

 a wrong way of doing most things, a young beginner may 

 observe the following directions : we will begin with the 

 wheel-horses. Before a coachman hits a wheel-horse, he 

 should twist his thong three times around the crop of his 

 whip, holding the crop at that moment somewhat horizon- 

 tally, by which means the thong will twist towards the 

 thin end of the crop, when the thong, being doubled, will 

 not exceed the length of a pair-horse thong, and in some 

 measure resembles it. Its being double renders it of 

 course more severe, by falling more heavily on the horse, 



