The combination of effects means the continued and exactly opposed force of the hand and legs. Its object should be to bring back again into a position of equilibrium all the parts of the horse which leave it, in order to prevent him from going ahead, without backing him, and vice versâ: finally, it serves to stop any movement from the right to the left, or the left to the right. By this means, also, we distribute the weight of the mass equally on the four legs, and produce temporary immobility. This combination of effects ought to precede and follow each exercise within the graduated limit assigned to it. It is essential when we employ the aids (i.e. the hand and legs), in this, that the action of the legs should precede the other, in order to prevent the horse from backing against any place, for he might find, in this movement, points of support that would enable him to increase his resistance. Thus, all motion of the extremities, proceeding from the horse himself, should be stopped by a combination of effects; finally, whenever his forces get scattered, and act inharmoniously, the rider will find in this a powerful and infallible corrective.
It is by disposing all the parts of the horse in the most exact order, that we will easily transmit to him the impulsion that should cause the regular movements of his extremities; it is then also that we will address his comprehension, and that he will appreciate what we demand of him; then will follow caresses of the hand and voice as a moral effect; they should not be used, though, until after he has done what is demanded of him by the rider's hand and legs.
The horse's resting his chin on his breast.—Although few horses are disposed by nature to do this, it is not the less necessary, when it does occur, to practise on them all the flexions, even the one which bends down the neck. In this position, the horse's chin comes back near the breast and rests in contact with the lower part of the neck; too high a croup, joined to a permanent contraction of the muscles that lower the neck, is generally the cause of it. These muscles must then be suppled in order to destroy their intensity, and thereby give to the muscles that raise the neck, their antagonists, the predominance which will make the neck rest in a graceful and useful position. This first accomplished, the horse will be accustomed to go forward freely at the pressure of the legs, and to respond, without abruptness or excitement, to the touch of the spurs (attaques); the object of these last is to bring the hind legs near the centre, and to lower the croup. The rider will then endeavor to raise the horse's head by the aid of the curb-reins; in this case, the hand will be held some distance above the saddle, and far from the body[E]; the force it transmits to the horse ought to be continued until he yields by elevating his head. As these sorts of horses have generally little action, we must take care to avoid letting the hand produce an effect from the front to the rear, in which case it would take away from the impulse necessary for movement. The pace commencing with the walk, must be kept up at the same rate, while the hand is producing an elevating effect upon the neck. This precept is applicable to all the changes of position that the hand makes in the head and neck; but is particularly essential in the case of a horse disposed to depress his neck.
It should be remembered that the horse has two ways of responding to the pressure of the bit; by one, he yields but withdraws himself at the same time by shrinking and coming back to his former position; this kind of yielding is only injurious to his education, for if the hand is held too forcibly, if he does not wait till the horse changes of his own accord the position of his head, the backward movement of his body would precede and be accompanied by a shifting of the weight backwards. In this case, the contraction of his neck remains all the while the same. The second kind of yielding, which contributes so greatly to the rapid and certain education of the horse, consists in giving a half or three-quarter tension to the reins, then to sustain the hand as forcibly as possible without bringing it near the body. In a short time the force of the hand, seconded by the continued pressure of the legs, will make the horse avoid this slight but constant pressure of the bit, but by means of his head and neck only. Then the rider will only make use of the force necessary to displace the head. It is by this means that he will be able to place the horse's body on a level, and will obtain that equilibrium,[F] the perfect balance of which has not hitherto been appreciated.
Resuming what we have just explained in the case of a horse who rests his chin on his breast, we repeat that it is by producing one force from the rear to the front with the legs, and another from below upwards with the hand, that we will soon be enabled to improve the position and movements of the horse. So that whatever may be his disposition at first, it is by first causing the depression of the neck that we will quickly gain a masterly and perfect elevation of it.
I will close this chapter by some reflections on the supposed difference of sensibility in horses' mouths, and the kind of bit which ought to be used.
Of the horse's mouth and the bit.—I have already treated this subject at length in my Comprehensive Dictionary of Equitation; but as in this work I make a complete exposition of my method, I think it necessary to repeat it in a few words.
I cannot imagine how people have been able so long to attribute to the mere difference of formation of the bars,[G] those contrary dispositions of horses which render them so light or so hard to the hand. How can we believe that, according as a horse has one or two lines of flesh, more or less, between the bit and the bone of the lower jaw, he should yield to the lightest impulse of the hand, or become unmanageable in spite of all the efforts of two vigorous arms? Nevertheless, it is from remaining in this inconceiveable error, that people have forged bits of so strange and various forms, real instruments of torture, the effect of which is to increase the difficulties they sought to remove.
Had they gone back a little further to the source of the resistances, they would have discovered that this one, like all the rest, does not proceed from the difference of formation of a feeble organ, like the bars, but from a contraction communicated to the different parts of the body, and, above all, to the neck, by some serious fault of constitution. It is, then, in vain that we attach to the reins, and place in the horse's mouth a more or less murderous instrument; he will remain insensible to our efforts as long as we do not communicate suppleness to him, which alone can enable him to yield.
In the first place, then, I lay down as a fact, that there is no difference of sensibility in the mouths of horses; that all present the same lightness when in the position called ramener, and the same resistances in proportion as they recede from this position. There are horses hard to the hand; but this hardness proceeds from the length or weakness of their loins, from a narrow croup, from short haunches, thin thighs, straight hocks, or (a most important point) from a croup too high or too low in proportion to the withers; such are the true causes of resistances; the contractions of the neck, the closing of the jaws are only the effects; as to the bars, they are only there to show the ignorance of self-styled equestrian theoricians. By suppling the neck and the jaw, this hardness completely disappears. Experiments a hundred times repeated give me the right to advance this principle boldly; perhaps it may, at first, appear too arbitrary, but it is none the less true.