After having advanced three Steps, let him stop, and turn him; you will by these means support him, and take him off from any ill Designs, which the Treatment you are obliged to observe towards him, in order to make him stop and go backward with Precision and Order, might otherwise give rise to.—After having turned him, make him go backward, you will prevent his having too great Desire of going too soon from the Place where he stopp'd, as well as from that to which he turned.
The Moment the Stop is made, give him his Bridle; by stopping you have augmented the Degree of the Apuy in the Horse's Mouth; you must increase it still more, in order to make him go backwards; hence a hard Hand and bad Mouth.
This Reasoning is plain, and these Principles are true; notwithstanding which, there are few Horsemen who attend to it, either because they never think and reflect, or else that the Force of bad Habits overcomes them.
This Lesson, if well weigh'd and given properly, is a necessary and certain Method of teaching Horses to make a good Stop, of rendering them light and obedient when they pull or are beyond the Degree of what is call'd full in the Hand.—But if given improperly, or if too often repeated, it then grows to be a Habit, and a Habit is no Correction. Never practise it long with Horses who are hot, and who have hard Mouths, their Impatience and Heat, join'd to Habit and Custom, would prevent them from knowing the Cause, and feeling the Effects. It is the same with those who have short Fore-hands; for as they are generally thick-shoulder'd and heavy, the Difficulty they feel to collect themselves upon their Haunches, naturally disposes them to press the Branches of the Bit against their Chest, by which means this Lesson becomes quite ineffectual.
CHAP. VII.
Of the uniting or putting a Horse together.
The End which the Horseman proposes to attain by his Art, is to give to the Horses, which he undertakes, the Union, without which, no Horse can be said to be perfectly drest; every one allows that the whole of the Art depends upon this, yet few People reason or act from Principles and Theory, but trust entirely to Practice; hence it follows, that they must work upon Foundations false and uncertain, and so thick is the Darkness in which they wander, that it is difficult to find any one who is able to define this Term of uniting or putting a Horse together, which is yet so constantly in the Mouth of every Body; I will undertake, however, to give a clear and distinct Idea of it; and for that Purpose shall treat it with Order and Method.
The uniting then or putting together, is the Action by which a Horse draws together and assembles the Parts of his Body, and his Strength, in distributing it equally upon his four Legs, and in re-uniting or drawing them together, as we do ourselves, when we are going to jump, or perform any other Action which demands Strength and Agility. This Posture alone is sufficient to settle and place the Head of the Animal, to lighten and render his Shoulders and Legs active, which from the Structure of his Body, support and govern the greater Part of his Weight; being then by these means made steady, and his Head well placed, you will perceive in every Motion that he makes, a surprizing Correspondence of the Parts with the whole. I say, that from the natural Structure of a Horse's Body, his Legs and Shoulders support the greatest Part of his Weight, in reality his Croupe or Haunches carry nothing but his Tail, while his fore Legs, being perpendicular, are loaded with the Head, Neck, and Shoulders; so that, let the Animal be ever so well made, ever so well proportioned, his fore Part, either when he is in Motion, or in a State of Rest, is always employed, and consequently in want of the Assistance of Art to ease it; and in this consists the Union or putting together, which by putting the Horse upon his Haunches, counterballances and relieves his fore Part.
The Union not only helps and relieves the Part of the Horse that is the weakest, but it is so necessary to every Horse, that no Horse that is dis-united can go freely, he can neither Leap nor Gallop with Agility and Lightness, nor run without being in manifest Danger of falling and pitching himself headlong, because his Motions have no Harmony, no Agreement one with another. It is allowed, that Nature has given to every Horse a certain Equilibre, by which he supports and regulates himself in all his Motions; we knew that his Body is supported by his four Legs, and that his four Legs have a Motion, which his Body must of necessity follow; but yet this natural Equilibre is not sufficient. All Men can walk, they are supported on two Legs, notwithstanding this we make a great Difference between that Person to whom proper Exercises have taught the free Use of his Limbs, and him whose Carriage is unimproved by Art, and consequently heavy and aukward.
'Tis just the same with respect to a Horse; we must have recourse to Art to unfold the natural Powers that lay hid and are shut up in him, if we mean he should make a proper Use of the Limbs which Nature has given him; the Use of which can be discover'd and made familiar to him no other way than by working him upon true and just Principles.