BRIDLES AND BRIDLING. 63 



means you gain and preserve the elasticity so necessary to 

 become a good rider; and not only that, but it gives 

 great relief to your horse's back. A very good way to 

 obtain this seat is to practice jockeying, which is to rise 

 in your stirrups, back again, very lightly, into your seat, 

 and up again and back, and so on regularly with the 

 motion of your horse, gradually rising and falling as he 

 moves slower or faster, and so be able to accommodate 

 your motion to his that your weight will be so distrib- 

 uted between the seat and stirrup as to produce the 

 greatest amount of that elasticity. When you once get 

 accustomed to it, you will find the fatigue of riding com- 

 paratively gone, and that you can ride five miles with less 

 fatigue than you could one with dead weight on the seat 

 all the time. Your legs and thighs also will be very much 

 relieved, and you will feel as comfortable as in an old- 

 fashioned rocking-chair at home. I don't mean to jockey 

 all the time, but to sit lightly, weight distributed. The 

 knee should be inclined in, for on it you depend for the 

 retention of your seat in case of a whirl or any other 

 difficulty ; the foot' just parallel with horse's side ; toe 

 neither in nor out, so that the spur cannot touch him 

 unless you wish to incline it. 



3d. To ride a kicking horse is not at all difficult: throw 

 your weight well back, and every time he kicks give him 

 a tremendous welting under the belly, or, if no whip, both 

 spurs in hard. He will soon tire of it. A rearer (the 

 opposite) is also easy enough, but not so easy : when he 

 goes up you rise in your stirrups and lean forward (watch- 

 ing that his head does not strike you in the face) ; if he 

 is pretty high up, put one hand on his poll, and press, 

 and as he comes down punish him. Unless a horse has 

 been taught to rear for playfulness when a colt, he is 

 easily cured; the plan before reciied under the method 



