LECTURES
ON
HORSEMANSHIP,
Wherein is Explained
EVERY
NECESSARY INSTRUCTION
FOR BOTH
LADIES and GENTLEMEN,
In the Useful and Polite
ART of RIDING,
WITH
EASE, ELEGANCE, and SAFETY,

BY T. S.

Professor of Horsemanship.

LONDON:
1793.

LECTURE on HORSEMANSHIP.
Address to the Audience.

LADIES and GENTLEMEN.

PERMIT me to observe that the Horse is an animal, which, from the earliest ages of the world, has been destined to the pleasure and services of Man; the various and noble qualities with which nature has endowed him sufficiently speaking the ends for which he was designed.

Mankind were not long before they were acquainted with them, and found the means of applying them to the purposes for which they were given: this is apparent from the Histories and traditions of almost all nations, even from times the most remote; insomuch that many nations and tribes, or colonies of people, who were entirely ignorant, or had but very imperfect notions, of other improvements and arts of life; and even at this day3-* are unacquainted with them, yet saw and understood the generous properties of this creature in so strong a light as to treat him with fondness and the greatest attention, sufficiently to declare the high opinion they entertained of his merit and excellence; nay in various regions, and in the most distant ages, were so far from being strangers to the many services of which the Horse was capable, as to have left rules and precepts concerning them, which are so true and just, that they have been adopted by their successors; and as all art is progressive, and receives additions and improvements in its course, as the sagacity of man at different times, or chance and other causes happen and concur: so that having the Ancient’s foundation to erect our building, it is natural to suppose that the structure has received many beauties and improvements from the experience and refinement of latter times.

It is generally supposed that the first service in which the Horse was employed, was to assist mankind in making war, or in the pleasures and occupations of the chase. Xenophon, who wrote three hundred years before the Birth of Christ, says, in an express treatise which he wrote on Horsemanship, that Cyrus hunted on Horseback, when he had a mind to exercise himself and horses.

Herodotus speaks of hunting on Horseback as an exercise used in the time of Darius, and it is probably of much earlier date. He particulatly mentions a fall which Darius had from his horse in hunting, by which he dislocated his heel: these and thousands of quotations more, which might be produced as proofs of the utility of the Horse, in remote ages, are truths so indisputably attested that to enlarge farther upon it would be a superfluous labour, and foreign to my present undertaking.

On Mounting Your Horse.

FIRST we will suppose your horse properly saddled and bridled. Take your Bridoun-rein (if you have Bit and Bridoun) your right-hand, shifting it till you have found the center of the rein; then with your switch or whip in your left-hand, place your little finger between the reins, so that the right rein lies flat in your hand upon three fingers, and your thumb pressing your left rein flat upon the right, keeping your thumb both upon right and left rein, firm upon your fore-finger; and in this position you ease your hand a little and slide it firmly down the reins upon your horse’s neck, taking a firm hold of a lock of his mane, which will assist you in springing to mount: remember that when you attempt to mount, that your reins are not so tight as to check your horse, or to offend his mouth, so as to cause him to rear, or rein back, but that your action is smooth and light as possible.

Your horse being firmly stayed, you next take your Stirrup-leather in your Right-hand, about four inches from the stirrup-iron, and fix one third of your foot in the stirrup, standing square with your horse’s side; next take a firm hold with your right hand on the Cantlet or back part of the saddle, rather on the off side of it, and with your left knee prest firm against the horse’s side, spring yourself up perpendicularly, bending the small of your back and looking chearfully up rather than down. The next move you make is to remove your right-hand from the Cantlet and place it firm upon the Pummel, or front of your saddle, bearing your weight upon it, at the same time bend your right knee, and bring your body round, looking strait over your horse’s head, letting yourself firmly and easily down into your seat, with the shoulders easily back, bent well in your waist or loins, and your chest well presented in front, with a pleasant uncontracted countenance.

You of course next recover or take your switch, which is done by putting your right-hand over your left, and with a quick firm motion take it in your right hand, holding the same perpendicularly.

Proceed us next to the adjusting the Reins, which is of the utmost use. Supposing you ride with Bit and Bridoun, being four in number, place them all even and flat in your left hand, exactly in the same manner as described in taking the Bridoun in mounting; that is to say, your four reins placed even, the one upon the other, remembering always to place your Bridouns on the outsides, so that you may any time lengthen or shorten them at pleasure, without putting the whole into confusion, and cause the Bit to act alone, or Bridoun alone, or both Bit and Bridoun to act together.

I have observed before that only your little finger should be between the reins when only two, it is the same now four, so now your two reins on the right side of your horse’s neck lie flat upon your three fingers in your left-hand, your two left reins placed flat upon the right, and your thumb pressed flat upon all four. This is the only sure method to keep your reins firm, free from confusion, and to cause them to act properly; which any lady or gentleman will be convinced of if they will only give themselves the pleasure to practise, as I cannot call it a trouble.

If it should be demanded why the horse would not ride as well with only the Bridoun, without the Bit? my answer is that suppose your horse becomes hard and heavy in hand, on being rode by both Bit and Bridoun, where they have both acted together: you on this shorten your Bit-reins whereby they act alone the Bridouns becoming slack, your horse instantly becomes light in hand, as though touched by a magick stick, reining his neck properly, is immediately light before, gathers himself upon his haunches, and what appeared, but now a garronly sluggish beast wears the appearance of a well dressed horse.

Well and