334 THE HORSE. 



I further found, to my unbounded surprise, that this horse 

 •would vault on the plane surface of the school, when tele- 

 gi-aphed to do so, as high as a hunter at a gate, and this several 

 times in succession. 



Although as obedient to my riding-school tutor as a con- 

 ceited young cub, who had rode fox-hunting, could be expected 

 to be, there was one point at issue between ns ; he advocated 

 the lengthened stirrup leather, straight knee, and erect military 

 seat. I pertinaciously adhered to the reverse, fully impressed 

 with the conviction that, having shown the way at fences to 

 some men in the hunting-field, and exhibited with success on a 

 race-course, I must know what riding was, better than all the 

 school tutors in existence. This would, no doubt, have been 

 fatal to my progress, had I been learning military horseman- 

 ship ; but as I was only placed there to learn hands, I conde- 

 scended to be instructed in this particular ; and both in that im- 

 portant qualification, and, indeed, in firmness of seat, I profited 

 much by my school practice. 



We now come to the third, and by far the best and most 

 certain mode of making a horseman. This is by putting a boy 

 on horseback very early in life, and also putting him under the 

 care of a good horseman, as his instructor. Practice will cer- 

 tainly, in a general way, teach a man of ordinary ability a good 

 and ready mode of doing that, which he has constant occasion 

 to do ; but it does not always follow, that by practice he learns 

 the very best mode of doing it ; he does it sufficiently well per- 

 haps to answer his purpose ; but if there is a better and quicker 

 mode of efi'ecting his object, he loses time by not adopting it, 

 and does not effect his object nearly so well. If a boy or man 

 has sense and temper enough to be taught, he will save an in- 

 finity of time, expense, and probably danger or hurt by learn- 

 ing ; if not, in the case of riding, let him get a severe fall or 

 two, or some equal inconvenience ; he will then learn that there 

 are others, who know a little more than himself, and he will 

 possibly afterward be willing to take instruction from any com- 

 petent hand. 



The result of these three different modes of learning horse- 

 manship would probably be this — The one who learns to ride 

 by sheer practice, will become very probably a good bold prac- 



