SEGUNDO.
MELTON BIT AND BRIDOON.
I dislike seeing a gag employed, and consider it altogether unnecessary, except for a buck-jumper, or an animal who determinately “bores” his head in a downward position; nor am I at all in favour of the twisted snaffle, which is a very severe bit, and does not answer any purpose, so far as I have ever been able to make out, that the chain-snaffle cannot be made to fulfil; for if severity be required, it can be obtained by twisting the chain before putting it into the horse’s mouth. I hate to see it, however, and never would permit its use in my own stables, except in the case of some animal that was known to be of an unusually fractious, or, I might say, evil temper. Severity in bitting is, in my opinion, very rarely necessary; and taking into account the cruelty of it, I dislike it excessively, and always cry it down.
LIVERPOOL.—FOR HARNESS ONLY.
CAMBRIDGE BIT.
I saw a man in Cheshire, when the Empress of Austria was hunting there, riding in a terrible bridle. He had a strong, wiry rope-bit attached to the horns of an ordinary snaffle—and it must have been frightfully severe, for the horse’s mouth was bleeding at both corners. I remarked to the Kaiserin that it was no wonder she was anxious to get away from that part of the country, if her sensitive eyes were often thus shocked. She looked at the man—at the horse—at the man again—and then said one word—“Brute!” It was certainly expressive, and concise,—and she spoke it in right sound English too, which I thought a very good thing.
The ordinary term “bit and bridoon” means simply a curb and a snaffle. The latter has been already explained. The common curb is merely a mouthpiece attached to two cheeks, and is curved in the centre, forming what is called a “port,” while a chain is attached to the cheeks in such a way that when the curb-reins are drawn tight, the chain presses upon the chin of the horse, and so restrains him.