194 DRIVING. 



drive of mine, and should you take this drive about four o'clock 

 in the afternoon, you will find plenty to do, and have a really 

 good practice. 



Do not stoop or lean forward, but sit quite upright on the 

 coach-box ; not at all stiffly. Hold your whip well up across 

 your body ; do not hold it close to the end, in the present 

 fashion, but some distance from the end, otherwise you have 

 no power to strike when necessary, and are very likely to let 

 the whip fall altogether. As to your reins, they should be held 

 as near your heart as possible, if you happen to have one ; if 

 not, where your heart ought to be. When you arrive at the 

 top of a hill, pull your leaders gently back, as their traces 

 should then be slack, and the bars should 'chatter.' When 

 about to rise a long steep hill, catch hold of all their heads and 

 trot up as far as possible, no matter how slowly, as in walking, 

 few horses step together ; consequently they will work better 

 together and rise the hill more easily at a slow trot. The 

 Scotch, or pressure drag, is an admirable and most useful 

 invention how glad we should often have been of such 

 assistance some fifty years since, on dark or foggy nights when 

 among steep hills with heavy loads and weak wheel-horses ! 

 But I must add that it is now most absurdly abused, as country 

 flymen put it on on all occasions, whether the hill is steep or 

 not ; and I also see young raw-boned coachmen using it con- 

 tinually, even when they stop or wish to do so ; whereas all 

 horses should be taught to stop the coach themselves, also to 

 run down any ordinary incline without any drag at all. My 

 drag-chain has broken more than once when half down a steep 

 hill ; but, with a strong sensible pair of wheelers, and sound 

 breeching, I never got into trouble. 



In old days, when wishing to shorten, or take up the reins 

 when driving, it was customary to seize the reins with the right 

 hand behind the left, and pull them back through the fingers 

 of the left hand ; but this is a slow process. You should learn 

 to take your reins back from the front, by placing the right 

 hand in front of the left, and pushing them back as quick as 



