THE BAKB AND THE BRIDLE. 103 



CHAPTER XIII. 



The Leaping Lesson. 



I COME now to a section of our courses of instruction, which, if not 

 as some suppose the most difficult to impart or acquire, is neverthe- 

 less of great importance. The principles, however, upon which a 

 horse "■ does a fence " neatly and safely, and those upon which 

 depend the secure riding of the lady, once properly understood, the 

 rest is a question of practice, the thorough training of the horse 

 and his complete fitness for his task being assiuned. The two latter 

 points are, however, of such vital consequence that I wiU endeavour 

 to direct attention to several matters connected with them, which I 

 trust may be useful. 



In the first place, then, it should be borne in mind that whereas 

 every horse of every breed in the world can be taught to jump, 

 jumping comes so aptly to some as to be perfectly natural, and no 

 more trouble to them with a fair weight than walking or galloping. 

 Such horses are easily taught to be clever ; that is to say, to do 

 " doubles," " in and out," and crooked places, with ahnost the 

 surefootedness of a goat, as well as to jump clean timber or fly 

 sixteen or eighteen feet of water. The sort of animal I speak of is 

 fond of jumping, and consequently when carefully broken learns to 

 balance himself with the greatest nicel:y ; and, provided the ground 

 is sound, you cannot get him down, while he does not know what 

 refusing means, except in the case of utterly impracticable places. 



It is upon such horses, or those which approach the nearest to 

 them in their quaUfications, that a lady should be mounted, not only 

 for the hunting field itself, but in her initiation in the riding school 

 into the art of riding her horse over a fence. Horses that rush at 



