568 The Book of the Horse. 



round him, ring a bell beside him ; repeat this every day for a week, and the lesson will 

 never be forgotten. A dozen foals may be thus treated by one man in a morning. 



"At six weeks old teach him to lead with a halter. Then put him down gently with the 

 Rarey straps, tie him when down, and flap clothes or blankets over him and on him, always caressing 

 him until he has ceased to fear. In subsequent lessons stand astride of him, crack your 

 stock whip over him, taking care not to touch him, fire your revolver first with caps, then 

 with a light charge of powder, so that he may see the flash and smell the smoke without 

 putting it so close as to deafen his ears. When you take him up, after rubbing his limbs to 

 do away with the numbness caused by the straps, lead him about according to the directions 

 already given. After half an hour's exercise, tie him up out of sight of his dam, leave him, 

 then return to him every few minutes for thirty or forty minutes, then lead him back to his 

 dam and loose him. 



" On the third or fourth day the foal will lie down whenever you touch his leg — an important 

 lesson, for a horse that will not lie down cannot travel for day after day on a journey that 

 may last a month. All the predatory Oriental tribes, the Kirghiz, the Turcomans, the Cir- 

 cassians, teach their horses to lie down at a touch. 



"At a year old strap up his leg, give him lessons with bells, drum, revolver, flags, &c., 

 saddle him with a crupper and a surcingle. When he is accustomed to these, put a small courageous 

 child on him ; a black child will do best, as blacks are lighter and more precocious than white 

 children. Let him caress the colt for a few minutes, dismount and remount on both sides. 

 Continue this treatment every day for a week, leading the colt mounted about with a short 

 rein, feeding him as he runs up to you, and after one week of daily lessons let the colt loose, 

 but repeat the same lessons once in every month until he is thirty months or two j'cars 

 old. 



" At two years old put a bit in his mouth and ride him two hours a day at a walking 

 pace for a fortnight. You will find that at three years old he only requires riding by a 

 competent horseman to be fit to go anywhere, and do anything a riding horse should do. 



" One man would be able to prepare one hundred horses for sale on this plan, and enable 

 the breeder to dispose of them perfectly broken, with not one buckjumpcr amongst them 

 at three, four, and five years old, at from thirty to one hundred pounds a-piece. The expense 

 for the man's wages and keep would not exceed one hundred a year. 



"I tried this plan myself," says the colonist, "on two or three foals and the like number 

 of yearlings and two-year-olds. It answered perfectly. However fat or ' flash ' they might 

 afterwards become, they were remarkably quiet to ride, none of them ever showing vice of 

 any description." 



COLONIAL AND ORIENTAL JOURNEYS. 



We have no long rides or drives with the same horses in England or the Europe of 

 railways and posting roads. But our countrymen become travellers and colonists. 



" It is the pace that kills." A horse may trot and canter sixty miles in one day, or 

 more, but he cannot go on repeating the distance at those paces day after day. On the 

 London stones it is found that thirteen miles a day for five or si.x days is as much as the 

 average omnibus horse can do and keep in condition. The jog trot — the huntsman's pace 

 — about five miles an hour, is that at which a horse can do the greatest distances for the 

 greatest number of consecutive days, with the least fatigue and loss of condition. The rider 



