However, if notwithstanding all the careful management we have described, a horse takes to rearing either through laziness or vice, or to plunging, or biting, or refuses to leave the tent or the other horses, recourse is had to the potency of spurs. These are made very sharp, and their point is bent in the form of a slightly rounded hook. With these instruments the rider draws long bloody wheals along the animal's belly and flanks, which inspire him with such terror that he becomes as tame as a lamb and will track his master out like a dog. Horses that have undergone this punishment rarely relapse into their former faults. To increase the potency of the spurs, salt or gun powder is rubbed into the still bleeding wounds. The Arabs are so convinced of the efficacy of this chastisement that they do not look upon a horse as thoroughly trained for war until he has passed through this terrible experience. At the same time that the rider uses the spurs to chastise a decidedly restive horse, he strikes him a little behind the headstall of the bridle with a short thick stick, with which he is always provided when he means to break in an animal of this kind.
In certain localities to prevent a horse from rearing they attach an iron ring to his ear. If he tries to rise up a smart blow with a stick is struck upon this ring, the pain thus caused soon sickening the animal of his bad "defence." To cure a horse of plunging, he is mounted with his tail towards a thick thorny shrub (gandoule). He is then urged forward, but jibs, lashes out, and pricks himself. However, after a few lessons of this kind, he breaks himself of his abominable habit.
The Arabs declare that spurs add one-fourth to the rider's horsemanship, and one-third to the spirit of the animal, and illustrate their assertion by the following fable:
"When beasts were first created, they had the gift of speech. The horse and the camel took an oath never to harm one another but to live, on the contrary, with a perfect mutual understanding. An Arab placed in a critical position by one of the chances of war, saw with despair the flight of the camel on which he had hoped to save his property. There was no time to lose. 'Bring my horse!' he exclaims, and leaps on his back. He scolds him, beats him, gives him the heel. All in vain. The horse stirs not a step, remembering the promise made to his friend. The Arab then puts on his spurs, which he carried in his djebira,[[37]] and the horse, smarting with his torn flanks, springs forward, and speedily overtakes the runaway. 'Ah! traitor!' cried the camel, 'thou hast violated our compact; thou tookest an oath never to do me any harm, and yet thou hast replaced me in the power of my tyrant.' 'Accuse not my heart,' replied the horse, 'I refused to move, but "the thorns of misery" have brought me up to thee.'"
It is not an easy task to use the spurs properly. Horsemen who possess that talent are cited even among the Arabs. Some are only able to urge on their steed by constantly tickling his flanks without wounding him. Others are acquainted only with the tekerbeâa, or the art of clashing their iron spurs against their iron stirrups in order to frighten the animal. The most skilful alone know how to raise those bloody wheals to which we have already alluded. When it is said of a horseman that he marks his horse with wheals from the navel to the vertebral column, the highest compliment has been paid to him. During my residence at Mascara, how often have I heard the Arabs assert, by way of vaunting the horsemanship of their Emir: "Abd-el-Kader! why, he crosses his spurs on his horse's loins!"
These spurs are dangerous for inexperienced horsemen, who sometimes prick the animal on the kneepan and so lame him if the wound be deep. And if a horse comes down, the spur is very apt to run into him. For this reason the Arabs generally have the leathers of their spurs tolerably loose, in order to obviate by their slackness, their own awkwardness. It also enables them to disembarrass themselves more quickly in battle if their horse happens to be killed and they are compelled to flee on foot to save their lives. On the same grounds they prefer in a serious combat loose-fitting shoes to boots. Our spurs they look upon as utterly inefficient. "What benefit, in a case where your life is at stake do you expect to get from them with a horse already knocked up? They are good only for tickling a horse and to make him restive. With our spurs we draw every thing out of him. As long as there is life in him, we will get it out of him: they lose their effect only in presence of death."
Every Arab trains his own horse. In the Sahara the only riding masters are practice, tradition, and example. A reputation as a good rider is only acquired after many proofs of skilfulness. It is not sufficient to be competent to manage a horse on level ground. It is necessary, gun in hand, to make the most of him at a rapid pace over a broken, wooded, and difficult country, "Such a one," say they, "is a horseman of the gun, while so-and-so is only a horseman of the heel." Perfection implies equal skill with the gun and the heel. They even go so far as to institute a difference between one who rides well over dry ground, and one who rides boldly over slippery ground. They distinguish between the horseman of summer and the horseman of winter.
What experience must not such an apprenticeship lay up! There is one point, however, which they entirely overlook—they never trouble themselves as to which leg the horse puts foremost. An Arab horse as always power and well formed shoulders which, owing to his practice as a colt of grazing on mountains, in woods, and on broken ground, have become far better developed than they would have been by means of the plate-longe and the riding school. He is also easy in his paces because the rider yields to all the movements of his body and never sets himself against them. I may add that the Arab has a perfect seat, and though he rides very short he makes up for that disadvantage by wearing very long spurs which, by the slightest movement of the leg, catch the horse on the flank, compel him to bring his hind-legs under the centre of gravity, keep him in hand, and place his head as correctly as if he had acted upon our best system of horsemanship.[[38]]
Arab horses have always a good mouth. A proverb says:
The horseman makes the horse,