440 HIGHIVAYS AND HORSES. 



requisite leather to choose from, unless he keeps a 

 stock of material utterly disproportioned to his busi- 

 ness. This writer, continuing, says that "the proper- 

 ties of leather may be completely spoiled by injudicious 

 cutting ; the grain should always run parallel to the 

 cut, otherwise the leather will stretch directly it comes 

 into use and continue to do so. Brown leather, which 

 we use for reins, is in every respect the same as 

 harness leather except in colour, it being bleached 

 instead of blackened, and afterwards stained a light 

 shade of brown." There is no part of a harness which 

 requires more attention than the reins, as were they to 

 break, even when driving a donkey, and all control 

 were lost over that humble quadruped, a very serious 

 accident might ensue ; in addition to this, the hand- 

 parts of reins should possess great softness and plia- 

 bility, as nothing tires the hands so much as having 

 thick, clumsy reins that will not bend when the hand 

 is closed. Yet reins should be very strong. " Some- 

 times the hand-parts of reins are made of white leather ; 

 this leather is obtained from the hide of the horse, 

 bleached and dressed in a solution of alum to preserve 

 it. White leather, however, is not fashionable, and it 

 is more generally used for whip-thongs." 



It is a strange thing that when a horse dies his 

 skin should be made into whip-thongs, that he may 

 thereby unconsciously be the means of inflicting punish- 

 ment on his fellow horses ; so that, when the lash is 

 brought down heavily on the flanks of some patient 

 and industrious animal, it is within the range of possi- 

 bility that, if the horse from whom this thong was 

 taken could only know the suffering his hide has been 

 instrumental in inflicting upon his fellow beast, his 

 ethereal bosom would be rent asunder with grief and 



