THE PIAFFER 



of the sort. The scientific equitation cannot con- 

 sider, teach, or admit any such devices. 



The quick piaffer has the cadence of the trot, 

 but the movements are rapid, and the action not 

 high. To obtain this type of piaffer, the horse is 

 first brought to the most complete possible state of 

 equilibrium and kept in this condition at the ma- 

 nege walk. The rider then makes repeated attacks 

 with the spurs, first with one, then with the other, 

 in diagonal, at a tempo faster than for the passage 

 and comparable to that of quarter-notes in music. 

 At each attack the spur touches the flank near the 

 girth, while the leg still maintains its pressure, and 

 then moves away no more than the twelfth of an 

 inch. 



In the meantime, the rider, by the accuracy of 

 his seat, helped by his fingering on the bridle, re- 

 ceives the excess of action given by the spurs, and 

 holds the center of this action at the center of grav- 

 ity. He should, thereupon, feel the hind limbs rise 

 and fall alternately, a little in front of the perpendic- 

 ular. If the hind legs are too far in front of the 

 perpendicular, the horse cannot continue to move, 

 except by contracting the two vasti muscles and 

 rearing high. If when the horse rears, the rider in- 

 stantly pushes it forward by leaning sharply to the 

 front, the horse will leap. But if the rider does not 

 immediately check the rearing, the horse will fall 

 backward at once or paw the air with its front feet 

 and then perhaps fall. But so long as the rider feels 



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