HORSE-BREAKING BY STEAM.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XXV, Issue 212, 7 September 1891, Page 4

HORSE-BREAKING BY STEAM.

Mr. Sample, who some time ago gave an exhibition of his system, of training at Henglor'a Circus, is now occupying the same building for the purpose of exhibiting his method of Bubjugating a horse by steam. In the centre of the arena ia the apparatus, consisting of a platform on which are two wooden sides, forming a narrow lane. Mr. Sample, in the course of some interesting remarks, explains that the general idea of horse-breaking is to treat horses so that they should become acoustomed to strange sights and Bounds, and should be used to be touched on unaccustomed parts of the body. His machine, upon which he has been working for two and a-halt years, is the outcome of 27 years' handling of hordes. Mr. Sample contends that this machine is a step in advance of all other methods he has taught, inasmuch, as the machine and nob the operator performs the bulk of the rough work. On the occasion of our visit a chestnut entire horse, belonging to Gen. Greene, cf the B. H. A., was brought into the ring, and walked quietly up a slightly sloped incline into the compartment oi the apparatus. When there a rope attached to a head collar on the horse was passed over a windlass in front of the horse. Canvas curtains were laced in front of his shoulders and behind his hocka, while ingeniously contrived lines were let down, the uprights upon which rings ran, and secured the horse over his witherß and quarters, bo that ho could neither kick nor rear. He was thus deprived of all liberty ef action, and could, Mr, Sample asserted, be handled by anyone while in that condition. The platfoim upon which the compartment is builb revolves, and can be worked by hand-power or by steam. Tho platform revolves qaickly, the occupant being presumably rendered giddy by the operation. On being brought) to a standstill the horee, which, on being first brought into the ring had shown no signs of vice, was handled by Mr Sample, and Buffered au umbrella to be brandished round its head aud to be pub on open over its oars. One of the uses of the steam engine, the operator Baid, was that when the horse was firmly fixed in the machine and could not Btruggle ib was the easiest thing in the world to turn on the steam, so that in a few minutes it would be"so familiar with it that he would not take notice of steam at railway stations, bridges, or in any other cirenmstances. This method, the operator alleged, enabled the trainer to make the horse familiar with objects he had previously dreaded. Moreover if a horse objected to a Bword being used by his rider, or to the motion of a polo stick, he could be quickly cured of his refusal to stand either by the simple expedient of a man sitting on his back (while tho horse was so confined) and doing the very things to which the horse objected. He invited anyone to send him the most vicious horse tbey could find. To guard against the possibility ot any drugs being given owners should be at perfeot liberty to keep their hoi'ses outside the building in charge of their own grooms until the moment they were required in the ring. Mr Sample undertakes to handle and subdue any horse, however vicious,