ON THE HABITS AND VICES OF HORSES. GO9 
attempts to mount him. A steed of this sort will always curve 
up his back, and fidget about for some time (as if lie were 
going to kick) at first mounting*. Now, this may be a great 
annoyance to a person who is not a good horseman; and it is 
one of those matters in which a purchaser is liable to be de¬ 
ceived, be he ever so good a judge of horse-flesh. 
I recollect, some years since, going to a fair in the county of 
Limerick with a brother officer who wanted to purchase a 
horse. We soon found one that both of us liked; and after 
due trial, in which the animal appeared to ride remarkably quiet 
and well, we bought him for 40/., and thought we had got a 
great bargain. The gentleman from whom we made this pur¬ 
chase had said a good deal about soundness, goodness, quiet¬ 
ness, and so forth; but after we had paid him the price, he 
having first taken the precaution of thrusting our two twenty- 
pound notes well home to the bottom of his breeches pocket—a 
movement which seemed to intimate there was but little chance 
of our getting them back again—said, “ Gentlemen, perhaps I 
ought to have told you that this horse is sometimes a little 
fidgetty at mounting, but it is only a w ay he has; there is no 
harm in it. 11 We took our bargain home, and the next morning, 
upon further trial, soon found out the secret. It required a man 
to hold this steed very fast by the head whilst any one was 
mounting him; and then he set up his back like a hedgehog , 
for at least a quarter of an hour after, fidgetting' about all the 
time, and threatening to kick every minute; he would then ride 
as quiet as any other horse for the rest of the day. Nothing, 
however, could break him of this, to say the least of it, ugly, 
ungraceful habit; and whenever he stayed in the stable two or 
three days together, he became very troublesome, notwithstand¬ 
ing the precaution of putting the saddle on for some hours 
before w anted. But he w as a good horse, and that which cannot 
be cured must be endured. We called him Bobby I vers. 
Now, the habit of stretching is an annoyance of the opposite 
kind, in which the animal appears to be giving way under the 
rider, bending his back downwards at mounting, or whenever 
he is allowed to stand still; and one would be led to suppose 
this arises from w eakness of the spine: no such thing; it is 
nothing more than a habit. 
These, how ever, are but innocent tricks, when compared with 
that of kicking against the crupper . This, indeed, is a serious 
evil, and properly denominated vice ; a vice which troop horses, 
especially mares, are more particularly prone to. “ As full of tricks 
as a soldier’s horse,'’ has been a common remark enough. And 
troopers certainly are somewhat more inclined to mischievous 
VOL. III. " 4 x 
