“Let any one observe a pair of English post-horses dragging a heavy weight up a hill, and he will at once see that the poor creatures are working by their muscles, and that it is by sheer strength that the resistance is overcome: but how can it be otherwise; their heads are higher than nature intended them to be, even in walking in a state of liberty, carrying no weight but themselves: the balance of their bodies is therefore absolutely turned against, instead of leaning in favour of their draught; and if my reader will but pass his hands down the back sinews of our stage-coach or post-chaise horses, he will soon feel (though not so keenly as they do), what is the cruel and fatal consequence. It is true, that in ascending a very steep hill an English postilion will occasionally unhook his bearing-reins; but the jaded creatures, trained for years to work in a false attitude, cannot in one moment get themselves into the scientific position which the German horses are habitually encouraged to adopt. Besides this, we are so sharp with our horses,--we keep them so constantly on the _qui vive_, or, as we term it, in hand, that we are always driving them from the use of their weight to the application of their sinews. That the figure and attitude of a horse working by his sinews are infinitely prouder than when he is working by his weight, (there may exist, however, false pride among horses as well as men), I most readily admit; and therefore, for carriages of luxury, where the weight bears little proportion to the powers of the noble animals employed, I acknowledge that the sinews are more than sufficient; but, to bear up the head of a poor horse at plough, or at any slow, heavy work, is, I conceive, a barbarous error, which ought not to be persisted in. “Whether there is most of the horse in a German, or of the German in a horse, is a nice point, on which people might argue a great deal: but the broad fact really is, that Germans live on more amicable terms with their horses, and understand their dispositions infinitely better, than the English; in short, they treat them as horses, while we act towards them and drill them as if they were men; and, in case any reader should doubt that Germans are better horse-masters than we are, I beg to remind him of what is perfectly well known to the British army,--namely, that in the Peninsular war the cavalry horses of the German Legion were absolutely fat, while those of our regiments were skin, and bone.” THE TURNINGS.