at nearly full speed, succeeds in getting to the other side, when the bushes close after him and his horse, and there is no more appearance of their transit than if a bird had hopped through. How he and his horse preserve their eyes, is a problem which the uninitiated are left to solve for themselves. It must be admitted that as much contempt of danger may be shown in following hounds across obstacles of this kind, as in mounting a breach; and the publications before us, Nimrod's in particular, abound with instances of extraordinary coolness, dogged determination, and intrepidity. Who can doubt for a moment that the gentleman commemorated in the following narrative, had he chanced to serve under Picton or Ponsonby at Waterloo, would have been found in the thickest of the fray ?—' ride no more to-day! Go to Leicester and put yourself into your carriage, and get to town as quick as you can, and get cured!' He took his friend's advice, and when he arrived there Mr. Heaviside found that he had two ribs broken, and his breast-bone beaten in!! This, we may also say, is not a bad sort of man to breed from."* It would seem that Sir Bellingham was much more likely to give such advice than to follow it: "As is the case with most hard-riding men, Sir Bellingham Graham has had some severe falls; but on two occasions he very narrowly escaped destruction. The following rare instance of his pluck, however, should not be lost to the sporting world:He was killing his fox at the end of a sharp thing, when an ox fence presented itself. Three first-rate "If I were asked who it was that had shown the performers were going in the same line, but they greatest contempt for the consequence of a bad fall would not have it. Sir Bellingham never turned his that ever came under my observation, I should have horse, and cleared all but the rail on the opposite no hesitation in saying, it was a gentleman by the side, which probably his weight would have broken; name of Stanhope, who was on a visit to Sir Belling- but unfortunately his horse alighted on one of the ham Graham when he hunted the Atherstone country. posts, and was turned over on his rider's chest. On the Friday his horse fell with him and hurt his Strange as it may appear, Sir Bellingham remounted shoulder, but nothing was broken or displaced. The his horse, and rode on; but he had not proceeded consequence was, he came out on the following Mon- many yards when he was observed by Sir Harry day with his arm in a sling. We found a fox in the Goodricke to be in the act of falling to the ground, finest part of Sir Bellingham's Leicestershire coun- but which he was fortunate enough to prevent. From try, and killed in fifteen minutes, during which Mr. that period-about twelve o'clock at noon till nine Stanhope was in a very good place. Having had o'clock the next night-Sir Bellingham never knew the pleasure of meeting him a few evenings before what had happened to him; and as he lay under the at Sir Bellingham's, I asked him if he did not find it haystack-whither his friends removed him at the very awkward to ride with only one hand, when he time of the accident-every moment was expected to assured me he found little difficulty with the horse be his last. The pith of the story, however, is yet he was then riding, as he was so very temperate, and to come. He was bled three times the first day, and had never given him a fall. That is dangerous to confined to his bed five. On the seventh, to the boast of,' said I to him; and here the conversation utter surprise, and indeed annoyance, of his friends, ended. We found another fox, and had a fine run of he was seen in his carriage at Scraptoff, merely as an hour and ten minutes, and killed. About the he said, 'to see his hounds throw off. The carriage middle of it we came to a brook, which we all got not being able to get up to the spinney, Sir Bellingwell over with the exception of Stanhope, who un- ham mounted a quiet old horse, (placed there, no fortunately pitching on a turn in the bank, and dis- doubt, for the purpose,) muffled up in a rough greatdaining to look, did not clear it, and his horse threw coat and a shawl, and looked on. The fox was him with great violence on the opposite side. I saw found; and, unfortunately for Sir Bellingham, took him lying on the ground, apparently as dead as if he a short ring, but returned, and his hounds came to a had been shot at Waterloo; and it was upwards of check close to where he was sitting upon his horse. five minutes before he showed any signs of returning Will Beck, the huntsman pro tempore, not being up animation. On getting back to Sir Bellingham's with his hounds, the baronet cast them and recovered house-having been blooded at Bosworth-all neces- his fox. In three fields they checked again, and sary measures were taken, and the doctor would fain Beck made a slow but by no means a brilliant cast. have persuaded Mr. Stanhope that some ribs were Sir Bellingham saw all this from the hill; and, no broken. He had a short husky cough, and two or longer a looker-on, he cantered down to his pack, and three other directing symptoms which seldom mis-hit off his fox again. Things still went on but awklead a skilful apothecary; but he resisted all such insinuations, and assured him he should be well in a few days; and the Quorn bounds coming within reach on the following Thursday, he went to meet them, still having his arm in a sling! "In the course of this day's sport, some of the party, among whom was Mr. Stanhope, got into a corner of a field, and were pounded. What is not very usual in this country, one of the hardest riders in England had dismounted, and was trying to pull off the top bar of a flight of rails, which did not otherwise appear practicable. Let me try,' said Mr. Stanhope, I am on a good one.' The sequel was, he rode at it and got a tremendous fall. On seeing him lying on the ground, Sir Bellingham rode up to him, and said- Now, I tell you what, Stanhope, you are a good one, but by G-you shall wardly. Another error was observed; when Sir Bellingham-annoyed that a large field should be disappointed of their sport when there was a possibility of having it-taking a horn from a whipper-in (for he could not speak to them) got to work again. "The hounds mended their pace: down went the shawl in the middle of a field. They improved upon it: down went the rough great-coat in another field. He then stuck to his hounds in a long hunting run of an hour and a half over a very strongly-fenced country, and had gotten his fox dead beat before him, when he was halloo'ed away by one of his own men to a fresh fox under the Newton hills. "Now, what was to be done? The excitement that had carried him thus far was gone, and it was all but who-whoop. With every appearance of exhaustion, and a face as pale as if he were dead, he sat *Nimrod's Hunting Tour. imself down on a bank, and faintly exclaimed, How I am to get home, heaven only knows!" " Mr. Henry Kingscote was riding a horse with one ye. The eye inflamed in the course of the run, and he horse became incapable of seeing any but upright objects; so that, whenever the ditch was on his side of the fence, he was certain to be down, as his master soon became perfectly aware. He had eleven had falls, yet got to the end of the run before the hounds had worried their fox. Mr. Assheton Smith (the Tom Smith of the sporting circles) was a perfect glutton in this line. It was computed that he had from sixty to one hundred falls a-year. He was once riding against Mr. John White, who arrived first at the only practicable place in a fence, but being unable to clear it, got what is called well bulfinched, and stuck fast. "Get on," said Mr. Smith. "I can't," said Mr. White. "Ram the spurs into him," exclaimed Mr. Sinith, "and pray get out of the way." "D-n it," said Mr. White, "if you are in such a hurry why don't you charge me?" Mr. Smith did charge him, and sent him and his horse into the next field, when away they went again as if nothing had happened. It seems that Mr. Smith's horses are trained to stop at nothing, for once, when he was turning round in the act of encouraging his dogs, his gallant steed carried him into the middle of a deep pond. Like master like man-Jack Shirley, Mr. Smith's whipper-in, was once seen galloping over a piece of broken ground, downhill, with the horse's head quite loose, whilst busily engaged in putting a lash to his whip, and holding a large open claspknife between his teeth! One of Mr. Lambton's whippers-in rode over a very high timber fence into a road, merely to turn hounds. Such was the force of the concussion, that the horse was unable to keep his legs, and fell floundering on his head. The rider, however, stuck to him, hanging at one time by his spurs, but he never ceased hallooing, "Get away, get away, hounds!" Another of these gentlemen had met with a good many falls in his time, but was never hurt in any of them: one unlucky day his horse fell with him, and rolling him (to borrow Nimrod's expression) as a cook would a pie-crust, nearly flattened all the prominences of his body. Getting up, and limping after his steed, he was heard muttering to himself "Well, now I be hurt!" A third described his horse as a dunghill brute, because, not content with tumbling," he lies on me for half an hour when he is down." A fourth had the following colloquy with Nimrod: "Why, sir, I have been very roughly handled. I have broke three ribs on one side, and two on t'other; both collar bones; one thigh; and been scalped. You remember Sir Watkins' Valentine?"-"To be sure, as vicious a brute as ever had a saddle on."-" Well, sir, he tumbled me down just as we were coming away with a fox from Marchviel gorse, and kicked me on the head till the skin hung down all over my eyes and face; and do you know, sir, when I gets to Wrexham, I faints from loss of blood." As a remarkable instance of presence of mind, we may mention the manner in which Stephen, Mr. Newton Fellowes' huntsman, extricated himself. Stephen charged the fence at the end of Mr. Buller's park; but when his horse got upon the banks, he found that, instead of "going in and out clever," if he once got in he should never come out, as the drop into the road was tremendous, and the road was newly covered with stone. Dreadnought (the horse) was not to be daunted; but Stephen, exclaiming no go, caught hold of the bough of a tree which fortunately hung over his head, and suffered his horse to leap from under him. What greatly enhances the merit where the dandy genus are concerned, is the risk they run of spoiling their beauty by an accident. 66 Billy Williamson was also out this day, and, I am sorry to add, met with a serious accident. We rode at a small fence into a road, when his horse fell, and threw him with much violence. Being close behind him, I was immediately aware that mischief had ensued; for on his horse and himself recovering their legs, one ran to the left, and the other to the right. There was something very frightful in the motions of Mr. Williamson; he ran wildly down the road, rubbing his head with his hand, for the space of fifty yards, and then fell to the ground. Mr. Hand myself instantly approached him, when we found all the front teeth of his upper jaw gone, his mouth full of blood, and he complained much of his head. I understand he is all right again now, with a fresh set of ivories; but it is rather a cruel trick for the old dame to play so good-looking a young man, and just in the heyday of youth. I like, however, the way he spoke of the accident afterwards. I would not,' he said, 'have taken a thousand pounds for my teeth; but I should not have cared so much for the loss of them, had the accident happened at the finish of a fine run.'"* We are credibly informed, that there was a considerable decrease in the number of female travellers by the Southampton railway for some time after a lady lost her nose; and historians have recorded, that Pompey's young patricians swerved and got disordered when Cæsar's veterans aimed at their faces. Perhaps it is the thought of Mr. Williamson's mishap that makes so many of our young Meltonians rejoice in the commencement of a frost, and brighten up, instead of growing melancholy, when cover after cover has been tried without finding. It would be curious to know how many of them think they have done enough for honour, when their clever hack, superb hunter, and well-appointed groom, have caught the attention of the field. It has been remarked, that nothing tends so much to make a field select as "a good rasping brook," like the Whissendine; for, if the horse falls, he generally falls backwards with his master under him; and the prospect of a good ducking is enough to cool the courage of all but the most ardent. It is, notwithstanding, by no means an uncommon occurrence for sportsmen to clear a brook five or six yards broad; and Mr. Mytton, the most dare-devil rider of his day, once leaped one measuring more than seven yardsthe space actually covered being nine yards and a quarter. What makes this exploit the more extraordinary, it was performed in cold blood on his return from hunting. He afterwards backed the same horse, Baronet, to clear nine yards over hurdles; but he performed the task so often before the appointed time, that he refused it then, and lost his master the bet. It stands recorded amongst the annals of Melton, that a wager of a hundred guineas was made between Lord Alvanley and Mr. Maher, that each did not leap over a brook of six yards width, without disturbing the water. Both cleared the brook, but Lord Alvanley's horse threw back a bit of dirt into * Nimrod's Hunting Tour. the water, and he thereby lost the bet. This is a curious exemplification of the verbal nicety to which the members of the Jockey Club, far exceeding special pleaders, restrict themselves. Like Mrs. Battle at whist, they invariably insist on the rigour of the game. Mr. Blaine says, that he himself saw a huntsman of the late Sir William Rowley clear twenty-four feet across a stream. If the horse leaps short, the rider stands little chance of sympathy When "the famous Dick Knight" hunted Northamptonshire, he rode over a wide and deep brook at the same time that a reverend gentleman was floating down it, having been landed (an odd mode of landing) in the middle. "The gentleman swims like a cork," said Dick, without ever thinking of assisting him. The best bit in Nimrod's spirited sketch of a run at Melton, is the crossing of that far-famed brook the Whissendine, the Rubicon of the Cæsars of the chase: man, leads to an inference that there is such a thing as Dutch courage in hunting as well as in fighting: "In most other countries," says Nimrod, "if a man wishes to anticipate his friend's performance for the day, the question he would ask would beWhat horse do you ride? Not so, however, in Shropshire. There are two or three of my friends in that sporting and most hospitable country, to whom the most likely question whereby to elicit the truth would be, not what horse do you ride to-day, but what have you had to drink? The fact is, the fences come very quick in Shropshire, and a little jumping-powder is often found useful; so, going into the public-house at Nescliff, by way of a beginning, I put the following question to the landlord :- How much brandy has Mr. Mytton had this morning?'None, sir,' was the reply.I cannot swallow that," said I.-It is true, I assure you,' said Bonifice. What else has he had then?' I resumed.-"Some egged ale, sir.'- Ah!' said I, some of your Shropshire squires, like many others, want a little egging on, now and then?'" In enumerating the dangers of fox-hunting, that of fording or swimming rivers well deserves a place. By a strange coincidence, three gentlemen were drowned on the same day in different parts of the country, whilst gallantly endeavouring to get to hounds-Mr. Edwards, Mr. Walbram, and the Rev. Marmaduke Theakstone. In speculating on the untimely fate of the latter, Nimrod is led into a curious error "Yooi, over he goes!-halloos the squire (Mr. Osbaldistone) as he perceives Marmion and Maida plunging into the stream, and Red Rose shaking herself on the opposite bank. Seven men out of thirteen take it in their stride; three stop short, their horses refusing the first time, but come well over the second; and three find themselves in the middle of it. The gallant Frank Forester' is among the latter; and having been requested that morning to wear a friend's new red coat to take off the gloss and glare of the shop, he accomplishes the task to perfection in the bluish-black mud of the Whissendine, only but there is every reason to believe that the weight "Mr. Theakstone, it is evident, was a swimmer, then subsiding after a three days' flood. Who is that under his horse in the brook?' enquires that of his clothes sank him at last; and, in the moment good sportsman and fine rider, Mr. Greene of Rol- of alarm, he had not the presence of mind to relieve leston, whose noted old mare had just skimmed himself by floating on his back, or by any of those over the water like a swallow on a summer's even- expedients which expert swimmers have recourse ing.It's Middleton Biddulph,' says one. Pardon me,' cries Mr. Middleton Biddulph; Middleton Biddulph is here, and here he means to be!'-Only Dick Christian,' answers Lord Forester, and it is nothing new to him.'-' But he'll be drowned!' exclaims Lord Kinnaird. I shouldn't wonder,' observes Mr. William Coke; but the pace is too good to enquire.' The Dick Christian, whose probable fate gave so little concern, is a celebrated rough-rider, who rides young horses with hounds, at the very moderate rate of fifteen shillings a-day. to when they find themselves exhausted. Perhaps, not have availed him; for, taking into consideration however, situated as he was, these expedients would that the clothes a man wears when hunting cannot be estimated at less than ten pounds when dry, it may be fairly concluded that when wet, with the weight must be more than double. Conceive, then, addition of water in the boots, pockets, &c., this a man swimming perhaps in dead water, with more than twenty-four pounds' dead weight hanging about him, all verging to the bottom, and opposing his efforts to sustain himself on the surface!" Does this clever writer require to be informed that Walls, to common apprehensions, are still more dangerous than brooks; but Irish horses and riders water cannot add to weight in water; or that the face them with the most perfect indifference. At the of the water displaced by them, is the only additional weight of a swimmer's clothes, over and above that great horse fairs of Ballinasloe, the parish pound, burden they inflict upon him, though they may fatally six feet in height, forms the trial leap for the high-check the free movement of his limbs? This little priced horses; and Mr. Blaine mentions an Irish mistake as to the nature of specific gravity, however, half-bred mare that leaped a wall of seven feet high, in no respect affects the soundness of his advice when built for the purpose, in Phoenix Park. In 1792, an Irish he comes to talk of the best mode of swimming a horse, the property of Mr. Bingham, cleared the wall horse. He recommends the rider to quit the saddle, of Hyde Park at a place where it was six feet and a half high on the inside, and eight without. This was a standing leap, and was performed twice, a few bricks being displaced the second time. Mr. Mytton is said to have once leaped a gate seven feet in height, on a horse purchased of Nimrod for five hundred guineas. An anecdote related of this gentle * The Chase, the Turf, and the Road, p. 56. The great mistake of this sketch is the designation given to the supposed provincial. Surely the high-bred members of the Melton Club are not in the habit of calling every well-mounted stranger, Snob. keep his body immersed, and hold fast by the mane. Sir Walter Scott relates, that when he read the hunt in the "Lady of the Lake" to Laidlaw, the honest yeoman listened with intense interest and in deep silence, till they came to the part where the when he shook his head, and exclaimed, that the hounds plunge into the lake to follow Fitzjames; to take water after such a run. dogs must be irretrievably ruined by being allowed We once heard a criticism elicited much in the same manner. passage was that, (in the "Lay,") where Deloraine pushes his horse into the Aill. The "At the first plunge the horse sunk low, Scarce half the charger's neck was seen." "Then it was all over with him," exclaimed our friend; "if the water broke over the saddle-bow, he must have lost his footing, and been swept down." With all due deference, he might have been saved by the very circumstance which the poet mentions as an additional difficulty: "For he was barded from counter to tail, And the rider was arm'd complete in mail.' A horse thus mounted and accoutred, would stem a rapid stream with comparative facility. The safest, though hardly the pleasantest, mode of crossing a river, is to follow the example of a Staffordshire gentleman when hunting with the late Mr. Meynell; the great Mr. Meynell," as he is still designated in the sporting world. He pulled off his coat and waistcoat before taking water. Lord Forester, who had got round by a bridge, asked a countryman whether he had seen the hounds, "Oh, yes, I see'd 'em; but you will never see 'em no more; they have been gone this quarter of an hour." “Who was with them?" said his lordship. "No one but the miller," was the reply, "and he was riding most 'nation hard, to be sure." This proved to be Mr. G. in his shirt. Lord Byron makes Don Juan no former : mean per "And now in this new field, with some applause, He clear'd hedge, ditch, and double fence and rail, And never craned, and made but few faux pas, And only fretted when the scent 'gan fail. He broke, 'tis true, some statutes of the laws Of hunting; for the sagest youth is frail; Rode o'er the hounds, it may be, now and then, And once o'er several country gentlemen." To the word craned is appended this note: "To crane is, or was, an expression used to denote a gentleman's 'stretching out his neck over a hedge -to look before he leaped;' a pause in his vaulting ambition,' which in the field doth occasion some delay and execration in those who may be immediately behind the equestrian sceptic.Sir, if you don't choose to take the leap, let me !' was a phrase which generally sent the aspirant on again, and to good purpose; for, though the horse and rider' might fall, they made a gap, through which, and over him and his steed, the field might follow." The late Lord Spencer was craning at a rasper which the celebrated Dick Knight" had just cleared. Come along, my lord," said Dick, looking back; "the more you look, the less you'll like it." The late Lord Forester neglected the precaution, and found himself in the middle of a pond. "Hold your tongue," was his reproof to a countryman who was calling for help, "we shall have it full in a minute." Unless we are much mistaken, this scene has been the foundation of a sketch, representing an Irishman, who is made the hero, so placed that the next comer must infallibly alight upon his head. As to the peccadilloes attributed to Don Juan, the most practised sportsmen are almost daily guilty of them. A friend of Nimrod accounts for having his arm in a sling by stating, that seventeen men had ridden over him; and (horrescimus referentes) we have heard that the Duke of Wellington, when huntJANUARY, 1842,-MUSEUM. 11 ing in Hampshire, saw no less than eight pair of glittering hoofs fly over him whilst he lay perdu in a ditch-no bad parallel to Blucher's mishap at Ligny. Riding over dogs is deemed a much more serious offence; yet, considering the impatience and inexpe rience of the greater portion of the field, the wonder is that the pack are not decimated every time they throw off. The horsemen may possibly be induced to wait until five or six couple have settled upon the scent; but the rest must scramble after as they best may; and nothing more strongly illustrates the speed and spirit of a fox-hound than the style in which he threads the throng, and dashes onwards to overtake his comrades. cular request, taken by the late Lord Rivers to witness An old captain in the navy was once, at his partia coursing match. The moment a hare was found, he put his horse to full speed and endeavored to. ride exclaimed his friend, as the captain rejoined the her down-"What the deuce have you been about?" hare, to be sure-what else are we here for?-and if party after a fruitless gallop. "Trying to catch the all of you had done as I did, we should have had her before this time!" be suspected of the same directly hostile intentions Many is the red-coated horseman who might well towards the fox. "Pray, sir, do you think you can catch him yourself?" said Mr. Ward to one of these heroes." No, sir."—"Then please to move out of the way, and let my hounds try." "Take care of the hounds, sir!" said Watty Wilkinson to the dandy.-"Oh! my horse never kicks." —“Perhaps not, but he may tread on their tails." Mr. Corbet was remarkable for the cutting politeness of his intimations. "Killed the best hound in my pack, that's all," was his sole remark to the offender as he galloped past him. When another hound was ridden over, and he did not know by whom, he rode about the field with, "They've killed me a favorite hound, sir: you don't happen to know who did it?" A sort of ascending scale is given by Mr. Beckford-a hold hard having proved ineffective. "I beg, sir, you will stop your horse."—" Pray, sir, stop."-"God bless you, sir, stop!“ G— ď▬ your blood, sir, stop your horse!" -n A Mr. Nicholl's famous retort is well known. gentleman not liking such language, said "I tell you what it is, Mr. Nicholl, I don't come out here to be d-d."-"Then go home and be d—d!” When it is remembered that, according to Mr. Beckford, hounds may be driven miles before the scent, by persons riding close upon them, a reasonable degree of warmth may be excused. These books contain a great deal of advice as to the best mode of relieving or assisting the horse; and neither Mr. Blaine nor Nimrod entertains the slightest doubt that the animal may be prevented from falling, or partially lifted to his leap, by a judicious management of the bridle. A little book, however, has recently been published, in which it is confidently contended, that not merely hunting-men, but equestrians in general, have conceived a very exaggerated, if not entirely unfounded notion of a rider's capabilities in this respect; and as the speculation has attracted less notice than its ingenuity well merits, we will take the opportunity of extracting the pith of it. The author is Lieutenant-Colonel Greenwood, late of the Life-Guards, confessedly one of the best riders and smartest cavalry officers in the service: SP. OF MAG.' 3. "How often do we hear a man assert, that he has | rein and crupper; that is, whose head is tied to his taken his horse up, between his hands and legs, and tail."* lifted him over a fence; that he has recovered his horse on the other side, or that his horse would have fallen with him forty times if he had not held him up! These are vulgar errors and mechanical impossibilities. Could ten men, with handspikes, lift the weight of a horse? Probably. Attach the weight to the thin rein of a lady bridle! Could a lady lift it with the left hand? I think not, though it is commonly supposed she could. A pull from a curb will, indeed, give the horse so much pain in the mouth that he will throw his head up; and this so flatters the hand that its prowess has saved him, that the rider exclaims, "It may be impossible, but it happens every day. Shall I not believe my own senses?" The answer is, No, not if it can be explained how the senses are deceived; otherwise we should still believe, as, till some few centuries ago, the world did believe, that the diurnal motion was in the sun, and not in the earth. Otherwise we must subscribe to the philosophy of the Turk, who He thus answers the obvious objection, that the back part of the animal may be used as a fulcrum to support the front: 'Saw with his own eyes the moon was round, "But these errors are not harmless errors. They induce an ambitious interference with the horse at the moment in which he should be left unconfused to the use of his own energies. If by pulling, and giving him pain in the mouth, you force him to throw up his head and neck, you prevent his seeing how to foot out any unsafe ground, or where to take off at a fence: and, in the case of stumbling, you prevent an action dictated alike by nature and philosophy. When an unmounted horse stumbles, nature teaches him to drop his head and neck; philosophy teaches us the reason of it. During the instant that his head and neck are dropping, the shoulders are relieved from their weight, and that is the instant that the horse makes his effort to recover himself. If, by giving him pain in his mouth, you force him to raise his head and neck instead of sinking them, his shoulders will still remain encumbered with the weight of them; more than this, as action and reaction are equal and in opposite directions, the muscular power employed to raise the head and neck will act to sink his knees. The mechanical impossibility of the rider assisting his horse when falling, may be demonstrated thus:-No motion can be given to a body without a foreign force or a foreign fulcrum. Your strength is not a foreign force, since it is employed entirely on the horse; nor can it be employed on the foreign fulcrum, the ground, through the medium of your reins. As much as you pull up, so much will you pull down. If a man in a boat uses an oar, he can accelerate or impede the motion of the boat, because his strength is employed through the medium of an oar, on the water, which is a foreign fulcrum; but if he take hold of the chain at the head of the boat, his whole strength will not accelerate nor impede the motion of the boat, because there is neither foreign force nor fulcrum. His whole strength is employed within the boat, and as much as he pulls backward with his hands he pushes for ward with his feet. "They indeed argue-surely if you throw back the weight of the shoulders over the croup of your horse, you relieve his forehand, and diminish the chance of his falling. This is rather to propose a new method of preventing a horse from falling, than to prove the advantage of pulling at the mouth while he is falling; for if it be of any advantage to throw back your weight, then the less you pull at the mouth the liberty to throw back your weight. But, in truth, it better; for the more you pull, the less you are at is of no advantage to throw back the weight when the stumble is made. If a position be previously taken up on the croup of a horse, the pressure will be less upon the forehand than if you were placed in a forward position. But during the time that the position is in the act of being shifted; that is, during the time that the horse is falling, the act of throwing your own weight backward produces an exactly equivalent pressure forward; in all respects the counterpart of your own motion backward, in intensity and duration. It is useless to dwell on this subject, or to adduce the familiar illustrations that it admits of. It is a simple proposition of mechanical equilibrium, and any one who is conversant with such subjects will assent to it." At the same time it is not denied that a horse may be lifted by the rider. On the contrary, the precise principle on which this apparent impossibility may be effected is explained; but it is clear, from the explanation, that not one rider out of a hundred could or would save or lift his horse in the only manner in which the power in question could be applied. assist his horse, does not rest on the same footing. "If the jockey made this muscular exertion every time his horse struck with his hind feet, his strength would be employed on the foreign fulcrum, the ground, through the medium of his horse's bony frame. Thus, the jockey would contribute to the horizontal impulse of his own weight; and, exactly in proportion to the muscular power exerted by the jockey, the muscular system of the horse would be relieved. At the same time, no additional task is thrown on the bony frame of the horse; since, if the "All the arguments which I have heard adduced against the doctrine here laid down, would also go to * Hints on Horsemanship. By an Officer in the House prove that a horse cannot fall which has a bearing-hold Brigade of Cavalry. London, 1837. |