THE DEFENSES OF THE HORSE 



some local trouble, such as pain in the kidneys, a 

 sore mouth, or sharp teeth. In the latter cases, re- 

 moving the cause will at once effect a cure. But for 

 weakness of loins or hocks, the remedy is progres- 

 sive work with the flexions with mobilization of the 

 hind hand backward. 



A standing martingale will, of course, keep the 

 head from being carried too high. But it will not 

 remove the cause. 



PULLING AGAINST THE HAND 



A HORSE pulls against the hand when it takes the 

 bit as a point of support. It may do this in either of 

 two ways. In one case, it may object to the pressure 

 of the bit on its bars, and may try to free itself of 

 the pain, by extending its neck forward with mus- 

 cles contracted, taking a point of support, and pull- 

 ing with all its might. The corrective for this is a 

 milder bit, and flexions of the mouth and neck. I 

 say, mouth and neck, because sometimes the bars are 

 the reason for the pulling, and sometimes the neck, 

 so that either may be the cause and either the effect. 

 In the other case, the cause is a bad conformation 

 which was not corrected at the beginning of the 

 education when the horse was young. A badly 

 shaped neck, a few saccades of the reins in the hands 

 of an unskillful rider, and the horse has so vivid a 

 remembrance that it bears against the hand to 

 avoid flexing its neck and opening its mouth. Some- 

 times, too, if the fore legs are weak, the animal 



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