The wrist must be able to work backward and forward like a spring. The horses are notified to start by lightly drawing in the reins. so as to se cure a slight pressure on every horse's mouth, after which a sign or a cry will notify the grooms to stand clear, and the horses will move off to gether. The team must be started at a walk, and the driver be prepared to hold in the leaders. Never use the whip unnecessarily. and before do ing so, in any event, have all the horses well in hand. To shorten the reins, take them between the fingers of the right hand and mill them back through the fingers of the left. To ease the left hand, change the reins into corresponding position in the right, but only when on a straight. clear road. Keep the leaders slightly in. so that their traces are slack. Go up-hill at a trot, or even at a gallop, as it keeps the team more even. Down hill, the horses should be well in hand. To turn to the right, take the right-hand leader's and wheeler's reins about eight inches away from the left hand, and pull them until the right hand is near the body; drop the left hand gently, then, as the team comes round to the right, steady the right-hand horses, ease out the reins of the left hand ones, and the team will straighten out. The turn to the left is a reversal of these methods. Stop gradually, taking in first the leaders' reins. then the wheelers'. Bring the team down to a slow trot and let them be almost at a walk before coming to a full stop. Pass the reins to the right hand and dismount.
The position of the reins in the driving hand is a much-disputed point, and one to which too much importance cannot be attaehed. Driving in America has ally been ably influenced by the methods ployed in England; and the 'tooling of fashionable coaches is still apt to be after the English fashion. The strictly
American method of holding the reins is seen in Figs. 1 and 2. the latter hieing known as the 'clubbed' hand. When all the reins are held in one hand. a rein in each finger-space, it is called a 'full hand' (Fig. 3), a method once very popular on the Continent of Europe. and even now considered good form in France. The great objection to the method, however. is that the off-wheel rein, of top of the little finger, cannot he firmly held, owing to the insufficiency of strength in that fin ger. In Switzerland and Italy, where there is con siderable four-horse traveling in both diligences and private traveling carriages, the professional eoachmen employ many different methods of handling, although all of them seem to be opposed in practice, at least, to the old French custom, or 'full hand,' already explained. The method of the Saint Moritz diligence (Fig. 4) is perhaps the best method employed on the Continent, and re sembles the English in that the lead reins and the wheel reins each adjoin; a method also employed by professional stage-coach drivers in America. In six-horse driving the English method is practically universal (Fig. 5). The lead reins. together with those of the middle pair. are held in the same position as would be the leaders and wheelers in four-horse driving; and the reins of the wheelers are then placed on the two sides of the third below all the others. Much more easy of control and handling is the method, sometimes resorted to, of harnessing three abreast on the lead, with two at the wheel.