TRANSITION OF PACES. 



173 



this line becomes oblique, showing that the synchronism is 

 disappearing. The direction of the obliquity of this line 

 proves that the hinder limbs grow slower in their movements 

 in passing from the trot to the walk. 



In the passage from the trot to the gallop the transition is 

 very curious ; it is represented by the notation, fig. 66. We 

 see, from the very commencement of the figure, that the trot 

 is somewhat irregular ; the dotted line which unites the left 

 diagonal impacts A G, P D, is at first rather oblique, and in- 

 dicates a slight retardation of the hind-foot. This obliquity 

 constantly increases, but only for the left diagonal biped ; the 

 right diagonal biped AD, P G, remains united, even after 

 the gallop is established. The transition from the trot to the 

 gallop is made, not only by the retardation of the hind-foot, 

 but by the advance of the fore -foot, so that two of the diagonal 

 impacts, which were synchronous in the trot, leave the greater 

 interval between them ; that which in the ordinary gallop con- 

 stitutes the great silence. An opposite change produces the 

 transition from the gallop to the trot, as is seen in fig. 67. The 

 transition from the gallop in four-time to that in three-time is 

 made by an increasing anticipation of the impacts of the 

 hinder limbs. 



SYNTHETIC STUDY OF THE PACES OF THE HORSE. 



The analytical method to which we have hitherto had 

 recourse in describing the paces of the horse may have left 

 many things obscure in this delicate question. We hope to / 

 clear them up by recurring to the synthetic method. 



When tracing, at the commencement of this study, the 

 synoptical table of the different paces, we classed their nota- 

 tions in a natural series, the first term of which is the amble, 

 and in which the difference between one step and the next 

 consists in an anticipation of the action of the hinder limbs. 

 This transition is just what is observed in animals. A drome- 

 dary, for instance, whose normal pace is the broken amble,* 



* Through the kindness of Mons. Geoffrey St. Hilaire, director of the 

 " Jardin d'Acclimatation," we have been permitted to study the paces of 

 different quadrupeds, and especially those of the large dromedary which 

 that garden possesses. 



