122 The Practical Stud Groom. 



them into the sand ring, straw yard, ploughed field, long 

 grass, stubble, or other suitable lungeing ground. To lunge 

 a yearling, or for that matter any horse, at top speed on 

 ordinary pasture in midsummer, when the ground is usually 

 baked hard, would be the height of folly. But in suitable 

 going no ill results need be apprehended, and it is beyond 

 dispute that lungeing, intelligently carried out, is an indis- 

 pensable adjunct to efficient breaking. If a batch of well- 

 fed, high-spirited yearlings are led out for two hours, their 

 pace will be regulated by the walking powers of their 

 attendants. At the end of the two hours the men will be 

 genuinely tired, but it will be different with the yearlings. 

 The humourist of the batch (there are generally several) 

 will be tempted to enliven the deadly monotony of the 

 promenade with a sudden squeal, buck, and kick, which, if 

 it catches the attendant off his guard, may mean a yearling 

 loose with a 30ft. long lungeing rein dangling at his flying 

 heels. Or, failing this calamity, his evil example will 

 spread like an electric flash through the entire string, and 

 instantly convert a comparative funeral procession into a 

 wild melee. If steps are not taken to cope with this habit, 

 the infection will increase from day to day, and attain such 

 dangerous proportions that the daily outings of the yearlings 

 will become a nerve-racking item in the stud groom's time 

 table. If any horse is fresh, and unable to restrain his high 

 spirits, all the thrashing in the world won't make him, 

 physically, less fresh ; it may cow him for the moment or 

 rouse his resentment. But a good spell of work or exercise 

 will actually take the freshness out of him, without leaving 

 him sour and resentful at what he considers unmerited 

 castigation. 



The principle of " making haste slowly " applies with 

 equal force to the breaking of yearlings as it does to the 



