Every Arab trains his own horse. In the Sahara the only riding masters are practice, tradition, and example. A reputation as a good rider is only acquired after many proofs of skilfulness. It is not sufficient to be competent to manage a horse on level ground. It is necessary, gun in hand, to make the most of him at a rapid pace over a broken, wooded, and difficult country, "Such a one," say they, "is a horseman of the gun, while so-and-so is only a horseman of the heel." Perfection implies equal skill with the gun and the heel. They even go so far as to institute a difference between one who rides well over dry ground, and one who rides boldly over slippery ground. They distinguish between the horseman of summer and the horseman of winter. What experience must not such an apprenticeship lay up! There is one point, however, which they entirely overlook—they never trouble themselves as to which leg the horse puts foremost. An Arab horse as always power and well formed shoulders which, owing to his practice as a colt of grazing on mountains, in woods, and on broken ground, have become far better developed than they would have been by means of the plate-longe and the riding school. He is also easy in his paces because the rider yields to all the movements of his body and never sets himself against them. I may add that the Arab has a perfect seat, and though he rides very short he makes up for that disadvantage by wearing very long spurs which, by the slightest movement of the leg, catch the horse on the flank, compel him to bring his hind-legs under the centre of gravity, keep him in hand, and place his head as correctly as if he had acted upon our best system of horsemanship.[38] Arab horses have always a good mouth. A proverb says: The horseman makes the horse, As the husband makes the wife. But it is not enough to have softened and tamed the horse. Although by means of kind treatment, daily intercourse, and punishment judiciously applied, he has become docile, and a good action has been secured, his education is still incomplete. It still remains to perfect him, and to do so they train him to the following exercises: _El Feuzzâa_, "setting off suddenly at full gallop." To accomplish this they pursue nearly the same method as ourselves, with this difference that they avail themselves of the aid of the _tekerbeâa_, which we have already described, so that a horse must be altogether impracticable if he does not act as he is required to do.