32 SEATS AND SADDLES. 



peculiar way; the halter and the riding barebacked tells 

 the tale. 



For the sake of simplicity, we have hitherto proceeded 

 on the supposition that each of the two diagonal legs (of 

 every pair) is lifted and set down simultaneously. This 

 is not the case. One hears distinctly four beats in the 

 case of walking and trotting, and two, three, or four in 

 cantering and galloping, according as the horse's weight 

 is adjusted in the latter movements. Of the two legs 

 acting in concert, the fore one is lifted and set down 

 somewhat sooner than the hind one ; were this not the 

 case, a horse could never tread in his own hoof-marks, 

 much less beyond them, as we shall presently show to 

 be the case. A musician could easily express on paper, 

 by the appropriate notes, the cadence not only of each 

 particular pace, but for each individual horse ; * and 

 good judges are well aware that irregularity of beat 

 points out something amiss in one or more legs. The 

 ear often conveys to us valuable impressions on this 

 very point that totally escape the eye even of the most 

 practised. We all have heard of blind men being good 

 judges of horse-flesh. f 



Having now seen the effect of action on equilibrium, 

 where such exists, it is necessary to point out its effects 

 and consequences in cases where it does not exist. In 

 the diagrams A, B, fig. 2, the horse is made to tread 

 with the hind foot into the track of the fore one (this is, 

 in fact, a consequence of equilibrium) ; but we see very 



* In the " Sonnambula," Bellini has imitated very successfully 

 the beat of several post-horses trotting and galloping just before 

 Rudolf o enters on the scene. 



t The theory of equilibrium, as set forth above, is not affected 

 in the slightest degree by this want of perfect coincidence in the 

 movement of the legs. 



