Page:Equitation.djvu/200

 the fault? Obviously, to the man. Yet it is the horse who is blamed and punished. But will the punishment change a law of nature? The more the poor brute is abused, the less is it correctly placed to execute the movement. No horse will ever refuse what is asked, when its rider has previously made sure that the placement is right.

A standing horse is correctly placed when the four legs, perpendicular to the ground, form a rectangle. In this position, each leg bears one quarter of the entire weight. Very few horses, however, take and keep this position instinctively. They have to be trained to it. In order, then, to place the horse, the rider needs to understand the diagonal effect for standing, walking, and trotting, and the lateral effect for the gallop, since these effects are the only means for correcting a wrong position and for maintaining the horse straight.

AHORSE is said to be straight when the whole spinal column, from the atlas to the last sacral vertebra, is precisely in line.

For the spine of a horse is like the keel of a boat. One could not steer a boat with a crooked keel, without strain on the hull and a waste of force on the rudder. Even more true is it for the horse that, with a crooked spine, the four legs will not carry equal weights, and the steps and strides, with their resultant, the gaits, will not be square and equal.