The Nech^ the Head^ etc. 1 33 



fill instrument — a good illustration, by the way, of the 

 lever action of the horse's neck on his hind legs. 



The interior of the horse's mouth is the object that 

 next demands our attention, but there is only a certain 

 portion of it with which we have here to do. It is easy 

 to perceive, on looking at a horse's mouth in and out- 

 side, that the lower jaw consists of two flat, irregularly 

 triangular cheek-bones, whose anterior branches form 

 a groove or channel in which the animal's tongue lies, 

 enclosed toward its root between the two rows of molar 

 or grinder teeth, further forward by those portions of the 

 jaw that lie between the point where the molar teeth 

 cease and the incisors or cutting teeth commence, known 

 generally as the ba7's, and on the lower portion of which 

 the tusks are to be found in male animals ; the channel 

 being closed in front by the incisors, and the tongue thus 

 fenced from injury on all sides. 



The bit, of whatever kind it may be, coming to be laid 

 somezvhere on the bars, and across the tongue, these are 

 the most important parts of the mouth to be acquainted 

 with. With the snaffle the portion of the bar exposed 

 to pressure varies according to the pull on the reins ; 

 with a regular bit furnished with a curb, this should not 

 be the case ; in fact, rational bitting demands that the 

 action of the bit should be confined exclusively to a cer- 

 tain point on each side, and it will be shown farther on 

 that the bit cannot act properly on any other point than 

 this one. 



We have a rule of thumb in this country for deter- 

 mining the place of the bit — namely, at a certain height 

 above the tusk ; but as mares and even many geldings 

 have no tusks, this is a very clumsy method, which is 

 supplemented in practice by hanging the bit in the 

 horse's mouth nearly as high as the angles of the lips 

 will allow it to go. This is about equally wise as it 

 would be to put the lock of a gun somewhere near th« 

 12 



