THE HORSE^S EDUCATION 



ments when they may make the most vivid im- 

 pression, and "tip" him with them as judiciously 

 as were your superiors moved to reward you, in 

 boyhood's days, when various delicacies were 

 yours if — always if — you did or did not thus 

 and so. 



Exhaustive and tedious rehearsals taught you 

 your letters, and no effort was ever made to have 

 you read before you could spell. A horse's 

 education should follow the same lines. About 

 the first lesson kindergarten taught you was that 

 you had to obey, and even as the traits of disobedi- 

 ence and disorder became more and more con- 

 firmed if not combated, so the habit of submission 

 might be developed to any length — so far that 

 even man, a reasoning and intelligent being, should 

 have no active and aggressive mind of his own. 

 This same habit of non-resistance may be developed 

 in the horse to a remarkable extent, and not too 

 early can the initiative in this respect be taken, 

 nor too sternly can it be enforced. 



Good manners in the subject who has never 

 been thoroughly " bested " — allowed to attempt 

 revolt and met only with summary defeat — are 

 but the merest shell, which, like the "shedder" 

 crab, he is likely to cast aside without a moment's 



93 



