378 MODE OF TAMING AND BREAKING-IN HORSES. 
then being to strike somewhere, and strike hard. At length, ex- 
hausted, as much, it appeared, by fright as by effort, and foiled 
in every attempt to get out of the reach of his assailants, the 
animal once more stood within the prescribed circle, without, seem- 
ingly, any inclination to quit it again, and was now quite obedient to 
the loud and angry ho! of the maitre-de- manege, who had fre- 
quently, in the course of the lesson, made use of the same sonorous 
and repressive exclamation, though not with the same effect as now. 
Now, therefore, was the time arrived for putting the animal through 
the exercises, which, it appeared, were to serve as tests of his 
implicit obedience. 
The first trial to which he was put was the cracking of a post- 
boy’s whip around him, behind him, and immediately under his 
nose ; all which he bore with extraordinary fortitude, his courage, 
as it seemed to me, having been forced up to this sticking point by 
the dread he felt of any renewal of attack with the spiked balls. The 
second trial he underwent was also one of sound. But this time 
the sound was of a nature and intensity almost to stun the spec- 
tators, much more the excited object of the experiment. It was 
no less than the noise made by a wooden rattle of enormous di- 
mensions — a sort of monster rattle — the horrible crashing sounds 
issuing from which were enough to split the membrance tympani of 
all present. The apprehension, however, the horse was already 
under of a repetition of the pelting, appeared to operate too strongly 
upon his nervous system for him to summon courage to move from 
his place, or indeed to shew any emotion save that of simply chuck- 
ing up his head, and so flinching, every time the rattle approached 
his muzzle. The third test of his submissiveness was blowing 
peas at him with all the force of breath (and that, we presume, is 
not feeble) M. Leonard could muster, through a pea-shooter of 
extraordinary magnitude. First, the peas were shot at his side, 
then at his quarters, from directly behind him, in which to him 
invisible situation, they, coming against him suddenly as they did, 
created, at first, some considerable alarm and crouching : this, 
however, was soon appeased by exclamations of ho ! and threat- 
enings of peltings; so that, afterwards, the shootings at the head 
failed to excite any emotion save chucking up or flinching. 
The fourth and last ordeal proved the triumphant one : it was no 
less than to pass unflinchingly through fire and flame. A truss 
of straw was brought into the riding-school, unpacked, strewed 
about, and then set light to; through which, in a state of flame, 
the animal was made to pass and repass by one of the assistants 
who had mounted him, as well at a walk as at a trot; and it was 
no less matter of surprise to everybody present to behold with 
