352 TIIK HOKSK. 



- The whole being accomplished in a Imndred and twenty- 

 one days, two hundred and forty-two lessons. 



OF THE FOKCES OF THE HORSE. 



The horse, like all organized beings, is possessed of a weight 

 and of forces pecnliar to himself. The weight inherent to the 

 material of which the animal is composed, renders the mass in- 

 ert, and tends to fix it to the ground. The forces, on the con- 

 trary, by the power they give him of moving this weight, of di- 

 viding it, of transferring it from one of his parts to another, 

 communicate movement, to his whole being, determine his 

 equilibrium, speed, and direction. To make this truth more 

 evident, let ns suppose a horse in repose. His body will be in 

 perfect equilibrium, if each of its members supports exactly that 

 part of the weight which falls upon it in this position. If he 

 wish to move forward at a walk, he must transfer that part of 

 the weight, resting on the leg which he moves first, to those ' 

 that will remain fixed to the ground. It will be the same thing 

 in other paces, the transfer acting from one diagonal to the 

 other in the trot, from the front to the rear, and reciprocally, in 

 the gallop. We must not then confound the weight with the 

 forces ; the latter producing the results, the former being sub- 

 ordinate to them. It is by removing the weight from one ex- 

 tremity to the other that the forces put tlie limbs in motion, or 

 keep them stationary. The slowness or quickness of the trans- 

 fers fixes the different paces, which are correct or false, even 

 or uneven, according as these transfers are executed with cor- 

 rectness or irreguhirity. 



It is understood that this motive power is subdivisible ad 

 iiifiniturn, since it is dispersed through aU the muscles of the 

 animal. When the latter, himself, determines the use of them, 

 the forces are instinctive ; I shall call them transmitted, wlien 

 they emanate from the rider. In the first case, tlie man is gov- 

 erned by his horse, and is merely the plaything of his caprices ; 

 in the second, on the contrary,' he makes tlie liorse a docile in- 

 strument, submissive to all the impulses of his will. The horse, 

 then, from the moment he is mounted, should act only by trans- 

 mitted forces. The invariable application of this principle con- 

 stitutes the true art of the horseman. 



