SUBJECTION OF INSTINCTIVE FORCES. 67 



would always prevent. As I shall point out hereafter in 

 classing the general division of the labor, it will be seen 

 that eight or ten days will be sufficient to obtain these 

 important results. 



Was I not right then in saying that if it is not in my 

 power to change the defective formation of a horse, I 

 can yet prevent the evil effect of his physical defects, so 

 as to render him as fit to do everything with grace and 

 natural ease, as the better formed horse ? In suppling 

 the parts of the animal upon which the rider acts 

 directly, in order to govern and guide him, in accustom- 

 ing them to yield without difficulty or hesitation to the 

 different impressions which are communicated to them, I 

 have, by so doing, destroyed their stiffness and restored 

 the centre of gravity to its true place, namely, to the 

 middle of the body. I have, besides, settled the greatest 

 difficulty of horsemanship : that of subjecting, before 

 everything else, the parts upon which the rider acts 

 directly, in order to prepare for him infallible means of 

 acting upon the horse. 



It is only by destroying the instinctive forces, and by 

 suppling the different parts of the horse, that we will 

 obtain this. All the springs of the animal's body are 

 thus yielded up to the discretion of the rider. But this 

 first advantage will not be enough to make him a com- 

 plete horseman. The employment of these forces thus 

 abandoned to him, demand, in order to execute the dif- 

 ferent paces, much study and skill. I will show in the 

 subsequent chapters the rules to be observed. I will 

 conclude this one by a rapid recapitulation of the pro- 

 gression to be followed in the supplings. 



Statio7iary exercise^ the rider on foot. Fore-parts. — 

 1.- Flexions of the jaw to the right and left, using the 

 curb-bit. 



