For instance, a horse has some disease, no matter what, affecting the left fore foot. A veterinary treats the trouble, but the horse, during the treatment, shrinks from putting its weight on the lame foot. The muscles, tendons, and ligaments of the left fore leg, therefore, doing less than their full duty, become more or less atrophied, while the right fore leg, doing more than its share, becomes correspondingly developed. When, at length, the diseased foot is cured and once more sound, no trouble appears so long as the horse stands still. But as soon as it begins to move, the weaker left leg fails to stride symmetrically with the stronger right. The trouble is, however, no longer in the foot, but in the muscles, ligaments, or tendons of the leg. The remedy is, then, gymnastic, to bring the weak organ to the level of the rest of the body. This belongs to the master of the scientific equitation. It is exactly like the case of a man kept in bed with a broken limb, whose physician gives him at first massage, and then, after the bone is knit, turns him over to an instructor in gymnastics, who, by flexions and exercises, restores the energy and elasticity which the patient lost during his enforced rest.
I have, I have said, always been criticized for not buying good and sound animals for myself, as other masters do. But to educate such an animal teaches the rider nothing. It is too easy. The master does not prove his own ability nor the practical
