ALMOST A FAILUKE. 479 



climbed upon the girt. Getting as short a hold of the halter 

 as I could, I took the chances of jumping towards her tail, 

 and caught it. The momentum of my jumping pulled her 

 head after, and threw her hind parts from, me ; a fact which 

 I improved upon, and pulled her around rapidly five or six 

 times, making her dizzy and disconcerted. I then reversed 

 quickly to the other side, catching the tail in the same man- 

 ner and running her around rapidly. This I repeated sev- 

 eral times, when I had her sufficiently disconcerted and 

 under control to make the next step ; namely, tying up her 

 leg and throwing her several times, after which I put on 

 the old form of War Bridle and made her follow me, mak- 

 ing the experiment a complete success. This took me not 

 more than ten minutes. So far as I know, this was the 

 first attempt ever made to halter a horse with a pole, or to 

 run one around in this way to make him dizzy and helpless. 

 The necessities of the moment drove me to this course as 

 the only way out of the corner in which I was placed, and 

 it was successful. It would be an easy matter for me to 

 control such a horse now, but taken as I was then, without 

 even a knowledge of first principles, it seemed like a great 

 success. 



The next horse experimented upon was a surly kicker, 

 though not in appearance very vicious, yet a far more dif- 

 ficult case to manage. The novelty and excitement of the 

 whole thing so interested me as to strike a new key in my 

 nature, and without reflection I dropped everything else, 

 and determined to engage in the horse-taming business. 

 My first step now was to inform myself upon the subject. 

 Procuring every book available upon the training and man- 

 agement of horses, I was surprised to find no authority 

 whatever on the subject except Rarey. His method of 

 treatment, though regarded as so much of a feat, seemed so 

 simple to me that I did not feel under any apprehensions 

 of being unable to do this, or even more. 



