MANAGEMENT OF THE REINS. 225 



the means by which we may circumvent a horse which has the 

 not uncommon trick in the stable of continually hanging back 

 against his head-collar chain. If we tie up the chain short with 

 a piece of twine when the animal is in his stall, we shall find 

 as a rule that when he throws his weight on the head-collar 

 and consequently breaks the twine, he will imagine himself free, 

 and will cease pulling against the chain, which still binds him. 

 Here I think we have got the explanation of the fact that 

 there are some men who are able to hold pullers, although they 

 are not particularly strong. They act according to the sound 

 though somewhat ambiguously expressed adage, that " if you 

 don't pull against a horse, the horse won't pull against you." 



10. Bumping up and down in the saddle is often due to the 

 rider maintaining too short a hold of the reins, which causes 

 him to be pulled forward at each stride. 



11. Reversed indications of the reins cannot be so easily 

 understood by a horse as direct ones; they are les^ effective ; 

 and are more liable to be irritating. Consequently their 

 employment is apt to spoil the animal's temper, both by 

 exciting him to resistance and by imparting to him the 

 dangerous knowledge of his own power. I particularly wish 

 to caution those of my readers who have not had much experi- 

 ence among horses, to avoid jerking the reins, as a signal for 

 the horse to go on ; because the practice of this reversed indi- 

 cation is liable to teach him to jib and rear, and will in all 

 cases more or less spoil his mouth. Its pernicious action in 

 these respects needs no explanation. This false indication is 

 habitually employed by the vast majority of persons who 

 drive horses in this country. 



1 2. Knowing the danger (to the animal's temper among other 

 things) of a horse dis6beying our orders, whether wilfully or on 

 account of his not understanding them, we should as a rule 

 prefer strong and direct indications to weak and reversed ones. 

 When the reins are held according to the military method in 



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