COERCION 



comfortable themselves. See that your headstall 

 is long enough, so that the pressure may lie on 

 the bars of the horse's mouth and not crumple 

 up the corners of his lips, like a gag. The curb- 

 chain will probably be too tight, also the throat- 

 lash ; if so, loosen both, and with your own hands ; 

 it is a pleasant way of making acquaintance, and 

 may perhaps prepossess him in your favour. If 

 he wears a nose-band it will be time enough to 

 take it off when you find he shows impatience of 

 the restriction by shaking his head, changing his 

 leg frequently, or reaching unjustifiably at the rein. 



I am prejudiced against the nose - band. I 

 frankly admit a man in a minority of one must 

 be wrong, but I never rode a horse in my life 

 that, to my own feeling, did not go more com- 

 fortably when I took it off. 



Look also to your girths. For a fractious 

 temper they are very irritating when drawn too 

 tight, while with good shape and a breastplate, 

 there is little danger of their not being tight 

 enough. When these preliminaries have been 

 carefully gone through mount nimbly to the 

 saddle, and take the first opportunity of feeling 

 your new friend's mouth and paces in trot, canter, 

 and gallop. Here, too, though in general it 

 should be avoided for many reasons, social, 

 agricultural, and personal, a little "larking" is 

 not wholly inexcusable. It will promote cordiality 



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