282 SCHOOL BREAKING. 



made them heavy in hand, were obhged to employ ex- 

 tremely severe bits to collect them. Baucher introduced 

 into school practice the admirable system of keeping the 

 horse light in hand by the use of the leg, or, if need be, of 

 the spur. Without wishing in any way to detract from the 

 credit due to Baucher in this matter, I may mention that the 

 system of riding a horse more by the legs than by the hands 

 appears to have been known in England and Ireland long 

 before the great Frenchman was born. Sam Chifney, who 

 was the Goorge Fordham of the latter end of the eighteenth 

 century, certainly knew it by the way in which he speaks 

 in Genius Gemiine of riding a horse in a race " as if you 

 had a silken rein as fine as a hair, and that you were afraid 

 of breaking it." Custance in Riding Recollections says : 

 " Fordham sat back in his saddle, and, as it were, drove his 

 horse from him." He also tells us that " Wells was a very 

 strong man on a horse, and used to lap his long legs round 

 them at a finish." This style of riding, I need hardly say, 

 has been traditional among jockeys who never heard either 

 of the " high school " or of Baucher. It was taught to 

 me in Ireland more than forty years ago when I was a boy, 

 as the old, orthodox method to follow. 



One of the first maxims of the high school is that the 

 horse must yield up the initiative entirely to his rider ; 

 that is, he should do nothing of his own accord. Hence 

 the rider must remain constantly in close touch with him 

 by hand and leg. If the pressure of the unarmed heel be 

 not sufilicient, the spurs will have to be kept close to the 

 horse's sides ; if possible, brushing through the hair with- 

 out touching the skin, unless required. To enable this to 



