(11) That a true balance not dependent on grip alone gives a free, quick, strong leg—the mark of a “strong” rider.
(12) That a true balance is founded on a proper length of stirrup, which alone can ensure the rider sitting really on his saddle.
(13) That the true balance, founded on a proper length of stirrup and pliability of body alone, gives the long free reins which is half the problem of hands.
(14) That to ride with too long a stirrup is a very common fault. It means too forward a seat, hence too short a rein, and consequently bad hands.
(15) That to ride with too short a stirrup is an uncommon fault, and only interferes with the hands in as far as it affects security of seat.
(16) That there is little variation between the seats of six first-class horsemen, a great deal between the seats of six secondary horsemen.
And so on with postulates ad infinitum, but to tabulate thus may make for lucidity.
Take No. 1. Many hunting men must constantly have seen a useless hand ride himself into a higher sphere of horsemanship, must have seen him by constant practice change from a stiff automaton at variance with his horse into a quick, pliable, strong rider; and Experience has been the mistress. But real experience means riding, firstly, many different horses; secondly, horses nice-tempered, but beyond him; thirdly, unbroken, hot and bad-tempered horses, and last, but not least, a “slug.” No man will learn to really ride if he always rides what he can manage; for that is not experience.
But to make a rider into a first-class man, to make him acquainted with the power of the leg, to teach him how absolutely essential it is, and how the automatic and non-fatiguing use of it alone makes the “strong” rider, and is half the battle in keeping to hounds, check-mating refusers, ensuring a perfect bridling of the horse and getting the uttermost jump out of him at a fence, then let him finish his education, which, by the way, never is finished, by riding a well-bred slug for a whole season on the top of hounds.
The remaining postulates more or less speak for themselves. They are all part of a whole, for it is hard to believe, if a man is to go in unison with his horse, that he can divide his equestrian body into parts. Hands and seats, as the writer understands hands and seats, are one, if horse and rider are to be one.