RIDING RECOLLECTIONS 



second horses were introduced, so that long before 

 the use of railways scarlet coats mustered by- 

 tens as to-day by fifties, and the crowd, as it is 

 called, became a recognised impediment to the 

 enjoyments of the day. 



Meantime fences were growing in height and 

 thickness; an improved system of farming sub- 

 divided the fields and partitioned them off for 

 pastoral or agricultural purposes ; the hunter was 

 called upon to collect himself, and jump at short 

 notice, with a frequency that roused his mettle to 

 the utmost, and this, too, in a rush of his fellow- 

 creatures, urging, jostling, crossing him in the 

 first five minutes at every turn. 



Under such conditions it became indispensable 

 to have him in perfect control, and that excellent 

 invention, the double-bridle, came into general 

 use. 



I suppose I need hardly explain to my reader 

 that it loses none of the advantages belonging to 

 the snaffle, while it gains in the powerful leverage 

 of the curb a restraint few horses are resolute 

 enough to defy. In skilful hands, varying, yet 

 harmonising, the manipulation of both, as a 

 musician plays treble and bass on the pianoforte, 

 it would seem to connect the rider's thought with 

 the horse's movement, as if an electric chain 

 passed through wrist, and finger, and mouth, from 

 the head of the one to the heart of the other. 



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