Vlll INTRODUCTION. 



consider the horse only a "brute" to be yanked, kicked and beaten, at the 

 pleasure or passion of the handler, the good "common sense" of any 

 man would naturally decide that the results would be equally surprising 

 in an opposite direction, viz.: that an unreliable, dangerous and pos- 

 sibly viscious animal was made so by his trainer, instead of a good, 

 serviceable, trusty, faithful and reliable horse. One of two things 

 should be done for the good of our horses. They should be taught 

 in established schools for their education, as we have for our children's 

 training, or everybody who expects to handle horses should study the 

 horse; study his character; study the natural laws that govern his ac- 

 tions; work in conformity with these laws instead of against them, as 

 when we put a halter on a colt's head and then expect to pull him after 

 us without resistance. Everyone who ever "broke" a colt to the halter 

 knows what the colt will do if the halter is pulled upon. He knows 

 he will go backwards, but how many men ever stopped and candidly 

 considered what made him pull backwards'* The colt thinks he has got 

 his head into some kind of a trap and he knows but one way out of it, 

 and that is to go backwards and pull it out. This lesson alone should 

 be sufificient to demonstrate to us that we were working at the wrong 

 end of the colt — in part at least — for we find when we attach something 

 to the rear end of his body, he as naturally goes forward. Then is it 

 not good "common sense" as well as Horse Sense, to operate on the 

 rear end for forward movements and use the halter for direction? The 

 pivotal point of the horse's action is the center of his body in opposite 

 direction, and the sooner we learn this and always keep it in mind, the 

 better we will get along with our horses. 



My attention to the capabilities of the horse in an educational way, 

 was when only a lad of ten years, with a strawberry roan mare that I 

 used for driving the cows to and from pasture. The mare soon demon- 

 strated that she had an interest in driving these cattle, as she seemed 

 to watch their movements very closely and was on the alert for any 

 "breaks" that any of them might make. She would stand and hold 

 the cattle while the bars were being let down, and if any one of them 

 offered to move out ot the way she was right after them. She was 

 always rewarded for her services with sugar, which she soon learned to 

 relish. She would sidle up to the fence for me to mount upon her bare 

 back, ard she soon learned to stand with her front feet upon the largest 

 boulders to be found, and some wee very large along the route. 



When about thirteen years of age I accidentally discovered what has 

 since proved to my entire satisfaction, the natural laws governing the 

 actions of our horses, and it is surprising that it has not been well es- 

 tablished long ago, when the facts are so apparent to every handler 

 and trainer, that the horse always acts just the reverse from what is 

 generally expected, and, notwithstanding this, almost all horsemen still 

 persist in working along the same old lines, in opposition to this natural 

 law and then wonder why horses do as they do. 



I have worked many years in farmers' institutes along this line, and 

 from the many kind greetings and the hundreds of letters received com- 



