The Lever ^ the Bit and Curb^ etc. 183 



to a mere horizontal slit ; but since the real principles 

 of bitting have become better understood, the simple 

 ring is preferred, and will be generally found to answer 

 all purposes perfectly, although, no doubt, there are 

 some cases where it might be convenient to use the 

 oval-shaped eye ; these are, however, very few indeed. 

 We have also hitherto considered the right and left side 

 pieces (upper and lower bar taken together) of the bit 

 as being in all cases parallel to each other, and conse- 

 quently at right angles to the mouthpiece. There are, 

 however, many horses, especially underbred ones, whose 

 heads will be found to project laterally, immediately 

 above the angles of the mouth, in a sudden instead of 

 the usual gradual manner ; and the width of the mouth- 

 piece is therefore insufficient to give the upper bars, 

 especially the rings, the requisite degree of play ; or 

 rather, the latter will most probably gall the horse's 

 cheeks more or less. There are two ways in which 

 this may be readily avoided : first, by inclining the 

 upper bars somewhat outward (fig. 14, a), or by making 

 the upper ring movable (fig. 14, b)^ instead of its form- 

 ing a continuation of the upper bar. Either of these 

 methods will be found to answer the desired end 

 without interfering with the proper action of the bit, 

 and are not only unobjectionable, but should be always 

 resorted to when necessary, because nothing is more 

 common than to see unthinking riders reject a bit whose 

 mouthpiece has the proper dimensions and adopt one 

 that is a quarter or half an inch too wide, simply be- 

 cause they find that the upper bars do not fit the out- 

 side of the horse's head ; in fact, this is what frequently 

 leads to a wrong selection of bits. People think of the 

 outside and visible part and neglect altogether the 

 much more important interior of the mouth and the 

 mouthpiece. 



It may be useful to summarise here the w^hole of what 



