CHAPTER XXXI 

 HANDS WITHOUT LEGS: LEGS WITHOUT HANDS 



" HANDS without legs, legs without hands," is the 

 name applied to a new principle in equitation enun- 

 ciated by Baucher only a few years before his death. 

 It resulted in a schism among horsemen, and the 

 new ideas were opposed by many masters and es- 

 quires. 



I have myself experimented with the new meth- 

 ods upon horses of very different qualities. My own 

 conclusion is that the system is practicable only for 

 a very able horseman training an animal of very 

 superior endowments, both physical and mental. 

 I do not regard the scheme as workable for any 

 rider dealing with a horse of inferior conformation, 

 or for an inexperienced rider dealing with any sort 

 of horse. 



For it must be evident that, with a horse of su- 

 perior conformation, the state of equilibrium is both 

 more easily obtained and more easily kept by the 

 ordinary principles of the reasoned and the scien- 

 tific equitation, hands and legs being used together 

 for the different movements, than with an inferior 

 animal. Moreover, the less perfectly conformed 

 the animal is, the more difficult is it to maintain the 

 state of equilibrium, even with the aid of hands and 

 legs together. 



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