l6 THE HORSE: ITS TAMING, 



that certain horses always did kick, and always will 

 kick. They will kick if the splinter bar should touch 

 them, when putting into or taking out of harness. 

 Some will actually kick if the pole should touch them 

 a little hard ; some will when the shafts first touch 

 them ; and some will without being touched at all, 

 at a noise for instance. Now, a horse that kicks at 

 all is certainly not a perfectly trained animal, nor 

 is he safe to ride behind. I knew of a horse that had 

 been in one family for over twenty years, and that 

 family a very kind one, and one day a bolt came out 

 of one of the shafts and it touched the horse on the 

 hock, and the animal at once commenced to kick, 

 and kicked till he smashed the trap to pieces and cleared 

 himself The owner of the beast told me he never 

 did it before. " No," I said, *' he did it behind that 

 time." He laughed, and said, " What made him 

 do it?" I said the shaft had never touched him 

 behind before, hence he didn't like it, and simply meant 

 to move it, obeying one of its natural laws. A colt 

 should be taught not to kick. 



Now, regarding the horse's senses, they are five 

 in number, the same as our own, viz.: — seeing, hearing, 

 tasting, smelling, and feeling or touch ; the last 

 named is, as it were, the largest sense the hor.se 

 possesses, the other four, of which smelling is the weak- 

 ' est, being quite local. There is no connection between 

 the act of snorting and the exercise of the sense of 



