is easily remedied by proper education, while the underlying good quality still remains.
BEHIND THE HAND
A HORSE is, on the contrary, said to be behind the hand when it is loath to take contact with the bit. This may occur for either of two reasons. A young horse may have become discouraged by being ridden under a hand without tact, which has maintained the contact too long, or has shaken too severely. Or the trouble may be weakness of hocks, haunches, loins, spine, or of the ilio-spinalis muscle or the great pectoralis.
Evidently, if the horse lacks strength in those parts of its mechanism which drive its body forward, it will hesitate to go forward against the bit; and will, in consequence, be behind the hand. Similarly, the horse which, at the beginning of its training, was willing to enter into contact, but has become discouraged, fearing the rider's tactless hand and the resulting pain, is really in an analogous condition to the weak horse. In either case, the fault must be remedied, since an animal which the rider cannot send against the bit is at all times ready to stop and enter into revolt. If the horse is behind the hand because it is badly conformed and weak, training is the cure. But if the horse is well conformed and strong, and still stays behind the hand, the remedy is education — more often for the rider than for the horse.
