Hotv to Render Horses Obedient. 219 



the purpose of combating- some special form of vice ; 

 nevertheless it is evident, from what has been just said, 

 that this instrument maybe used with advantage by those 

 who wish to train on the English system. What we have 

 here given is merely a sketch of so much of the school 

 system as suffices to bring horses into obedience — in 

 fact, the A B C of the method — as it would lead us alto- 

 gether beyond the limits we have proposed to ourselves 

 to go farther than this into the detail of manege-riding, 

 even if we felt ourselves competent to do so, which is 

 far from being the case. Our object was to show by 

 what means, within almost every rider's reach, perfect 

 control may be obtained over the horse's head, neck 

 and hind legs, and this because it is by the aid of these 

 members of its bodv, especially the last-named ones, 

 that the vicious or insubordinate horse is enabled to 

 defy its rider. 



Up to the point at which we have now arrived it will 

 have been most advisable to use a snaffle, either alone 

 or in combination with Seeger's running-rein, which 

 enables us, while we lift the horse's neck and head by 

 the upward and backward pull on the snaffle-reins, to 

 limit exactly the degree to which this elevation takes 

 place. When the neck, and with it the head, have been 

 got into the desired position — which is. we repeat, 

 always that in which the horse trots perfectly "clean" 

 and in "obedience" — the next step is to get the head 

 into its proper position witli regard to the neck, and 

 this is done by means of the curbed bit. 



What sort of bit should be selected, and how it ought 

 to be put into the horse's mouth, has been already fully 

 explained, and all that will be further necessary to ac- 

 custom the horse gradually to this in precisely the way 

 pointed out already for getting it to accept other limita- 

 tions of its freedom. If all this be done carefullv, skil- 

 fully, above all, patiently but resolutely, the result w^ill 



