My percheron horse Toby eyes me expectantly, standing next to me in companionable silence, interrupted by a tail swish or two. I have a soft cotton rope tied around his right ankle. Which doesn't seem to bother him a bit. (In fact, I can lead the big buffalo with a rope tied around his leg. Prep work for hobbling.) This is a draft horse who loves to be fiddled with, and he is eating up all of this attention while keeping an eye on C., knowing there are carrots hidden somewhere on that little boy.

I've read this section on teaching your horse to shake hands several times (a prelude to my goal of teaching Toby to bow), but ask J. to read it to me again. Just once more for good measure. She takes a deep breath and dives in.

It is customary for people to shake hands when greeting. When you greet a horse, the only difference is that you shake a hoof instead. With dogs, shaking a paw is an oldie but a goodie, a real—

My assistants make up with their zeal what they lack in experience. Knowing this introduction to be several paragraphs long, I say, "No, no, J! Just read me Step 1, please."

She frowns at me as if it offends her delicate sensibilites to skip ahead in the text, then hesitates for a moment while C. blurts, "Do you need the treat yet?" He stops rummaging through his pockets when I toss him an emphatic nod NO. Meanwhile, my fifth-grade purist finds the place further down on the page, and reads aloud the words above her index finger.

STEP 1: With a halter and lead rope on your horse, and standing your horse next to a fence or wall by his right side, stand directly in front of him, facing him with the long, soft cotton lead rope tied around his right ankle by the snap.

"Got it," I say, like an airplane pilot going through the pre-flight checklist.

Make sure the snap or rope is padded enough not to hurt him. Holding the lead rope in your right hand, say, "SHAKE," gently pulling your horse's right leg up. Catch his right foot wtih your right hand and "shake hands." Reward him with a piece of carrot.

I give the rope a gentle tug. Ask, "Shake?" Toby stares at me, immobile as Mt. Everest.

"You've got to do it harder than that, Mom," advises C, who is at the same time covertly reaching into his pocket in preparation for the treat portion of the exercise.

"It says here that you've got to 'say your commands like commands,'" adds J, holding up the book to illustrate that she's not just making this stuff up off the top of her head.

I steel myself for the second try. Tug the rope again, a little harder this time. The word "Shake" goes from my lips through the evening air into Toby's very large and fuzzy ears and makes its way to his brain, where big equine synapses begin firing, and all of a sudden he is offering a pie-plate hoof, muscled leg outstretched like a dancer's, then lets it fall back to earth before I have a chance to do any actual hoof shaking.

"Well, that was a try," I announce to audience and assistants. The heeler sisters wriggle in bob-tailed excitement. I nod approvingly at C. who is already coming at us with a single baby carrot. Take it from his hand and offer it to Toby, who rarely gets treats, and who cranks his entire mouth open wide, apparently to chomp off my arm at the elbow or beyond so he won't miss a single morsel. I push my hand up and against his muzzle, kind of squooooooshing the whiskery jaws back together, and he plucks the carrot from my hand with his lips, just tickling my palm with his teeth. "Good Boy!" I tell him.

J. reads on.

Repeat several times, giving him a carrot every time his foot is pulled up.

She puts a finger on her cheek, clearly deep in thought. "I think that means, like, 6 or 7 times," she finally says. "So this next try is #1."

"No, it's #2," declares C, waving the bag of carrots.

Toby looks at him with longing. Caprichosa whickers from across the fence and licks her lips.

I pull on the rope again, and say, "SHAKE, Toby." This time the big hoof snaps way off of the ground and I reach forward to hold it. Toby is rather surprised when I shake it up and down a few times energetically as if he is an oversized Black Lab. (The tenacious heeler sisters can't even do this yet.) He gobbles another carrot. No teeth this time. His coal eyes soften beneath a fringe of jet lashes when I say, "Good. Good!"

We repeat five six more times.