152 



ANIMAL MECHANISM., 



observation in order to analyse tlie paces of the horse, have 

 not been able to give all the details. We trust that we shall 

 be more fortunate in our treatment of the subject ; but we are 

 assured, at least, of the perfect exactitude of the data fur- 

 nished by the apparatus which we have used. 



Colonel Duhousset has been kind enough to offer us his 

 assistance in representing the horse in its various paces ; it is 

 to his skilful pencil that we owe the figures represented in this 

 chapter, which are the faithful translation of the notation 

 which accompanies them. We are also indebted to Mons. 

 Duhousset for some documents relating to the representation 

 of the paces. 



The knowledge of the pistes — that is to say, the impressions 

 which the feet of the horse leave on the ground — is of great 

 importance ; they enable an experienced eye to recognise the 

 pace of the animal which has marked them. 



These pistes are of extreme value to the artist; they 

 alone can represent to him the limbs as they strike the ground, 

 with the true distances which they ought to preserve from 

 each other according to the size of the horse and the speed of 

 the pace. We refer the reader to the works of Vincent and 

 Goiffon, of Baron Curnieu, of Colin, &c., on this subject, con- 

 tenting ourselves with giving merely, from these writers, the 

 piste which characterises each pace. 



The first series of experiments, the results of which we are 

 about to analyse, were made in the riding school of Mons. 

 Pellier, ^Zs. The horses were furnished, on each foot, with 

 an instrument for determining pressures, similar to that which 

 is represented in fig. 42. We shall first discuss the experi- 

 ments on the trot ; the tracings which they give are easy to 

 be understood ; the study of these will serve as a preparation 

 for the more complicated analysis of the other paces. 



OF THE TROT, 



Experiments on the trot. — An old and very quiet horse fur- 

 nished the tracing represented in fig. 45. In this plate are 

 shown at the same time the tracings of the pressures of the 

 four feet with their notations, and on the other side, the re- 

 actions produced on the horse by this kind of pace. 



