(Peter Paul Rubens – Detail from Equestrian Portrait of the Duke of Lerma – The Collection – Museo Nacional del Prado)
“Now for your Cherishings, they are those which I formerly spake of;
Only they must be used at no time but when your Horse doth well,
And hath pleased your mind, both with his cunning and tractableness:
Although the time for the same be when he hath finished his Lessons,
Yet there is a secret pleasing and cherishing of a Horse with the Bridle, which must be exercised in the doing of his Lessons,
And that is the Sweetning of his Mouth by a little ceasing of your Bridle hand, and gently drawing it up back again,
Letting it come and go with such unperceiving motion, that none but the Beast may know it.”
~ Gervase Markham, 1676.