100 ARABS POWER. 



200. — The care, consistency, and gentleness that the breaker 

 exercises at this stage, will make the difference between a good 

 and a bad mouth, between the horse that could be ridden with a 

 pack thread, and one that will require two leather reins and a jaw 

 breaking bit to steer and restrain him. There is a very great 

 natural difference in horses in this respect. Some will never l)ear 

 jerking and tucking about with a rough hand, others will get to 

 bear more and more of it, until they will allow a clumsy rider 

 to hang on to their mouths with a snaffle bit, to raise himself in 

 the saddle, without stopping or taking any notice of it ; or will 

 bear a wrench with a curb chain and iron lever, that would make 

 a more irritable horse stand on his hind legs. But there are very 

 few well bred and well formed horses that with light handling at 

 first will not learn to have light pleasant mouths ; indeed we have 

 never met with one. 



201. — Most horses can easily be tauglit to go any pace and 

 to guide, stop, or turn without touching the reins at all. They 

 will take all their signals from the rider's legs and the way he 

 sits or turns his own body. Indeed, the great majority of horses 

 long ridden by one even tempered, unfickle man, will learn to do 

 this whether you wish them to or not, will start off at a gallop 

 the moment you put yourself in a position for it, canter if you sit 

 right for that, trot directly you put more weight in the stirrups, 

 walk whilst you sit loose and easy, stop the moment you throw 

 your foot out of the right stirrup, and turn to either side if you 

 turn yourself, drawing one leg a little back and the other forward. 

 This is the whole secret of the sudden and effectual manner in 

 which the Arabs can gallop, stop, turn, or steer their horses, 

 with nothing on their heads but a single reined bitless halter, 

 and with neither stirrups nor spurs ; whilst our supposed skilful 

 English officers tell us that after purchasing the same horses they 

 find them headlong and impetuous, and that they cannot so 

 completely control and suddenly stop them, with tlie most 

 powerful bits. 



202. — It is amusing to read the accounts which English 

 officers have given of this (to them) surprising fact, and the 

 reasons they gravely assign for it. Such writers have evidently 



