In the Riding-School; Chats with Esmeralda Part 7

"Never mind; they aren't fastened on with a safety pin," retorts the beauty, plucking up spirit, unexpectedly.

"O, no! of course not," the wise fairy interposes, with a little laugh. "You young ladies do not do such things, of course. But, do you know, I heard of a lady who wore a switch into a riding- school ring one day, and it came off, and the riding master had to keep it in his pocket until the end of the session."

Little does the wise fairy know of the society young lady's ways!

What she has determined to say, she declines to retain unsaid, and so she cries: "And you do thrust your head forward so awkwardly, Nell!"

"'We are ladies,'" quotes Nell, "and we can't answer you," and the society young lady finds herself alone with the wise fairy, who is suddenly very busy with her books, and after a moment, she renews her announcement that she is not coming any more. "Well, I wouldn't," the wise fairy says, looking thoughtfully at her. "You make the others unhappy, and that is not desirable, and you will not be taught. I gave you fair warning that the master would be severe, but those who come here to learn enjoy their lessons.

Once in a great while there are ladies who do not wish to be taught, but they find it out very soon, as you have."

"There is always a good reason for everything," the master says gravely. "Now, I have seen many great men who could not learn to ride. There was Gambetta. Nothing would make a fine rider out of that man! Why? Because for one moment that his mind was on his horse, a hundred it was on something else. And Jules Verne! He could not learn! And Emile Giardin! They had so many things to think about! Now, perhaps it is so with this young lady. Society demands so much, one must do so many things, that she cannot bend her mind to this one little art. It is unfortunate, but then she is not the first!" And with a little salute he turns away, and the society young lady, much crosser than she was before he invented this apology for her, comes into the dressing room and-- bids you farewell? Not at all! Says that she is sorry, and that she knows that she can learn, and is going to try. "And I suppose now that nothing will make her go!" Nell says, lugubriously, as you saunter homeward.

You are still conscious of stiffness, Esmeralda? That is not a matter for surprise or for anxiety. All your life you have been working for strength, for even your dancing-school teacher was not one of those scientific ballet-masters who, like Carlo Blasis, would have taught you that the strength of a muscle often deprives it of flexibility and softness. You desire that your muscles should be rigid or relaxed at will. Go and stand in front of your mirror, and let your head drop forward toward either shoulder, causing your whole torso to become limp. Now hold the head erect, and try to reproduce the feeling. The effect is awkward, and not to be practised in public, but the exercise enables you to perceive for yourself when you are stiff about the shoulders and waist. Now drop your head backward, and swing the body, not trying to control the head, and persist until you can thoroughly relax the muscles of the neck, a work which you need not expect to accomplish until after you have made many efforts.

Now execute all your movements for strengthening the muscles, very slowly and lightly, using as little force as possible. After you can do this fairly well, begin by executing them quickly and forcibly, then gradually r.e.t.a.r.d them, and make them more gently, until you glide at last into perfect repose. This will take time, but the good results will appear not only in your riding, but also in your walking and in your dancing. You and Nell might practise these Delsarte exercises together, for no especial dress is needed for them, and companions.h.i.+p will remove the danger of the dulness which, it must be admitted, sometimes besets the amateur, unsustained by the artist's patient energy. Before you take another cla.s.s lesson, you may have an exercise ride, in which to practise what you have learned. "Tried to learn!" do you say? Well, really, Esmeralda, one begins to have hopes of you!

X.

--Ye couldn't have made him a rider, And then ye know, boys will be boys, and hosses, --well, hosses is hosses!

_Harte_.

When you and Nell go to take your exercise ride, Esmeralda, you must a.s.sume the air of having ridden before you were able to walk, and of being so replete with equestrian knowledge that the "acquisition of another detail would cause immediate dissolution," as the Normal college girl said when asked if she knew how to teach. You must insist on having a certain horse, no matter ho much inconvenience it may create, and, if possible, you should order him twenty-four hours in advance, stipulating that n.o.body shall mount him in the interval, and, while waiting for him to be brought from the stable, you should proclaim that he is a wonderfully spirited, not to say vicious, creature, but that you are not in the smallest degree afraid of him. You should pick up your reins with easy grace, and having twisted them into a hopeless snarl, should explain to any spectator who may presume to smile that one "very soon forgets the little things, you know, but they will come back in a little while."

Having started, you must choose between steadily trotting or rapidly cantering, absolutely regardless of the rights or wishes of any one else, or else you must hold your horse to a spiritless crawl, carefully keeping him in such a position as to prevent anybody else from outspeeding you. If you were a man, you would feel it inc.u.mbent on you to entreat your master to permit you to change horses with him, and would give him certain valuable information, derived from quarters vaguely specified as "a person who knows," or "a man who rides a great deal." meaning somebody who is in the saddle twenty times a year, and duly pays his livery stable bill for the privilege, and you would confide in some other exercise rider, if possible, in the hearing of seven or eight pupils, that your master was not much of a rider after all, that the "natural rider is best," and you would insinuate that to observe perfection it was only necessary to look at you.

If, in addition to this, you could intimate to any worried or impatient pupils that they had not been properly taught, you would make yourself generally beloved, and these are the ways of the casual exercise rider, male and female. But you, Esmeralda, are slightly unfitted for the perfect a.s.sumption of this part by knowing how certain things ought to be done, although you cannot do them, and alas! you are not yet adapted to the humbler but prettier character of the real exercise rider, who is thoroughly taught, and whose every movement is a pleasure to behold.

There are many such women and a few men who prefer the ring to the road for various reasons, and from them you may learn much, both by observation and from the hints which many of them will give you if they find that you are anxious to learn, and that you are really nothing more pretentious than a solitary student. So into the saddle you go, and you and Nell begin to walk about in company. "In company," indeed, for about half a round, and then you begin to fall behind. Touching your Abdallah lightly with whip and heel starts him into a trot and coming up beside Nell you start off her Arab, and both horses are rather astonished to be checked. What do these girls want, they think, and when you fall behind again, it takes too strokes of the whip to urge Abdallah forward, Arab is unmoved by your pa.s.sing him, and you find the breadth of the ring dividing you and Nell. You pause, she turns to the right, crosses the s.p.a.ce between you, turns again and is by your side, and now both of you begin to see what you must do. Nell, who is riding on the inside, that is to say on the included square, must check her horse very slightly after turning each corner, and you must hasten yours a little before turning, and a little after, so as to give her sufficient s.p.a.ce to turn, and, at the same time, to keep up with her. You, being on her left, must be very careful every moment to have a firm hold of your left rein, so as to keep away from her feet, and she must keep especial watch of her right rein in order to guard herself.

After each of you has learned her part pretty well, you should exchange places and try again, and then have a round or two of trotting, keeping your horses' heads in line. You will find both of them very tractable to this discipline, because accustomed to having your master's horse keep pace with them, and because they often go in pairs at the music rides, and you must not expect that an ordinary livery stable horse would be as easily managed.

It is rather fas.h.i.+onable to sneer at the riding-school horse as too mild for the use of a good rider, and very likely, while you and Nell are patiently trying your little experiment, you will hear a youth with very evident straps on his trousers, superciliously requesting to have "something spirited" brought in from the stable for him.

"Not one of your school horses, taught to tramp a treadmill round, but a regular flyer," he explains.

"Is he a very good rider?" you ask your master. "Last time he was hear I had to take him off Abdallah," he says sadly, and then he goes to the mounting-stand to deny "the regular flyer," and to tender instead, "an animal that we don't give to everybody, William." Enter "William," otherwise Billy b.u.t.tons, whom the gentleman covetous of a flyer soon finds to be enough for him to manage, because William, although accustomed to riders awkward through weakness, is not used to the manners of what is called the "three-legged trotter"; that is to say, the man whose unbent arms and tightened reins make a straight line from his shoulders to his horse's mouth, while his whole weight is thrown upon the reins by a backward inclination of his body.

If you would like to know how Billy feels about it, Esmeralda, bend your chin toward your throat, and imagine a bar of iron placed across your tongue and pulling your head upward. It would hurt you, but you could raise your head and still go forward, making wild gestures with your hands, kicking, perhaps, in a ladylike manner, as Gail Hamilton kicked Halicarna.s.sus, but by no means stopping. Now suppose that bar of iron drawn backward by reins pa.s.sing one on each side of your shoulders and held firmly between your scapulae; you could not go forward without almost breaking your neck, could you? No more could Billy, if his rider would let out his reins, bend his elbows, and hold his hands low, almost touching his saddle, but, as it is, he goes on, and if he should rear by and by, and if his rider should slide off, be not alarmed. The three-legged trotter is not the kind of horseman to cling to his reins, and he will not be dragged, and Billy is too good-tempered not to stop the moment he has rid himself of his tormentor. But while he is still on Billy's back, and flattering himself that he is doing wonders in subjugating the "horse that we don't give to everybody," do you and Nell go to the centre of the ring and see if you can stop properly. Pretty well done, but wait a moment before trying it again, for it is not pleasant to a horse. Sit still a few minutes, and then try and see if you can back your horse a step or two.

In order to do this, it is not enough to sit up straight and to say "back," or even to say "bake," which, according to certain "natural riders," is the secret of having the movement executed properly. You must draw yourself up and lean backward, touching your horse both with your foot and with your whip, in order that he may stand squarely, and you must raise your wrists a little, and the same time turning them inward. The horse will take a step, you must instantly sit up straight, lower your hands, and then repeat the movement until he has backed far enough. Four steps will be quite as many as you should try when working thus by yourself, because you do not wish to form any bad habits, and your master will probably find much to criticise in your way of executing the movement. The most that you can do for yourself is to be sure that Abdallah makes but one step for each of your demands. If he make two, lower your hands, and make him go forward, for a horse that backs unbidden is always troublesome and may sometimes be dangerous.

"Just watch that man on Billy b.u.t.tons," says your master, coming up to you, "and make up your minds never to do anything that you see him do. And look at those two ladies who are mounting now, and see how well it is possible to ride without being taught in school, provided one rides enough. They cannot trot a rod, but they have often been in the saddle half a day at a time in Spanish America, whence they come, and they can 'lope,' as they call it, for hours without drawing rein. They sit almost, but not quite straight, and they have strength enough in their hands to control any of our horses, although they complain that these English bits are poor things compared to the Spanish bit. You see, they can stay on, although they cannot ride scientifically."

"And isn't that best?" asked Nell.

"It is better," corrects the master. "The very best is to stay on because one rides scientifically, and that is what I hope that you two will do by and by. There's that girl who always brings in bags of groceries for her horse! Apples this time!"

"Isn't it a good thing to give a horse a tidbit of some kind after a ride?" asked Nell.

"'Good,' if it be your own horse, but not good in a riding- school. It tends to make the horses impatient for the end of a ride, and sometimes makes them jealous of one another at the mounting-stand, and keeps them there so long as to inconvenience others who wish to dismount. Besides, careless pupils, like that girl, have a way of tossing a paper bag into the ring after the horse has emptied it, and although we always pick it up as soon as possible, it may cause another horse to shy. A dropped handkerchief is also dangerous, for a horse is a suspicious creature and fears anything novel as a woman dreads a mouse."

What is the trouble on the mounting-stand? Nothing, except that a tearful little girl wants "her dear Daisy; she never rides anything else, and she hates Clifton, and does not like Rex and Jewel canters, and she wants Da-a-isy!"

"But is it not better for you to change horses now and then, and Daisy is not fit to be in the ring to-day," says your master.

"Jewel is very easy and good-tempered. Will you have him?"

"No, I'll have Abdallah."

"A lady is riding him."

"Well, I want him."

It is against the rules for your master to suggest such a thing to you, Esmeralda, but suppose you go up to the mounting-stand and offer to take Jewel yourself and let her have Abdallah. You do it; your master puts you on Jewel, and sends the wilful little girl away on Abdallah, and then comes up to you and Nell, thanks you, and says, "It was very good of you, but she must learn some day to ride everything, and I shall tell her so, and next time!"

He looks capable of giving her Hector, Irish Hector, who is wilful as the wind, but in reward for your goodness he bestows a little warning about your whips upon Nell, who has a fancy for carrying hers slantwise across her body, so that both ends show from the back, and the whole whip is quite useless as far as the horse is concerned, although picturesque enough with its loop of bright ribbon.

"It makes one think of a circus picture," he says; "and, Miss Esmeralda, don't hold your whip with the lash pointing outward, to tickle Miss Nell's horse, and to make you look like an American Mr. Briggs 'going to take a run with the Myopias, don't you know.' Isn't this a pretty horse?"

"Well, I don't know," you say frankly; "I'm no judge. I don't know anything about a horse."

For once your master loses his self-possession, and stares unreservedly. "Child," he says, "I never, never before saw anybody in this ring who didn't know all about a horse."

"Well, but I really don't, you know."

"No, but n.o.body ever says so. Now just hear this new pupil instruct me."

The new pupil, who thinks a riding habit should be worn over two or three skirts, and is consequently sitting with the aerial elegance of a feather bed, is riding with her snaffle rein, the curb tied on her horse's neck, and is clasping it by the centre, allowing the rest to hang loose, so that Clifton, supposing that she means to give him liberty to browse, is looking for gra.s.s among the tan. Not finding it, he snorts occasionally, whereupon she calls him "poor thing," and tells him that "it is a warm day, and that he should rest, so he should!"

"Your reins are too long," says your master.

"Do you mean that they are too long, or that I am holding them so as to make them too long," she inquires, in a precise manner.

"They are right enough. Our saddlers know their business. But you are holding them so that you might as well have none. Shorten them, and make him bring his head up in its proper place."

"But I think it's cruel to treat him so, when he's tired, poor thing! I always hold my reins in the middle when I'm driving, and my horse goes straight enough. This one seems dizzy. He goes round and round."

"He wouldn't if he were in harness with two shafts to keep his head straight"--

"But then why wouldn't it be a good thing to have some kind of a light shaft for a beginner's horse?"

"It would be a neat addition to a side saddle," says your master, "but shorten your reins. Take one in each hand. Leave about eight inches of rein between your hands. There! See. Now Guide your horse."

He leaves her, in order that he may enjoy the idea of the side saddle with shafts, and she promptly resumes her old att.i.tude which she feels is elegant, and when Clifton wanders up beside Abdallah, she sweetly asks Nell, "Is this your first lesson? Do you think this horse is good? The master wants me to pull on my reins, but I think it is inhuman, and I won't, and"--but Clifton strays out of hearing, and your arouse yourselves to remember that you are having more fun than work.

There is plenty of room in the ring, now, so you change hands, and circle to the left, first walking and then trotting, slowly at first, and then rapidly, finding to your pleasant surprise, that, just as you begin to think that you can go no further, you are suddenly endowed with new strength and can make two more rounds. "A good half mile," your master says, approvingly, as you fall into a walk and pa.s.s him, and then you do a volte or two, and one little round at a canter, and then walk five minutes, and dismount to find the rider of the alleged William a.s.suring John, the head groom, that redoubtable animal needs "taking down."

"Shall ride him with spurs next time," he says. "I can manage him, but he would be too much for most men," and away he goes and a flute-voiced little boy of eight mounts William, retransformed into Billy b.u.t.tons, and guides him like a lamb, and you escape up stairs to laugh. But you have no time for this before the merciful young woman enters to say that she is going to another school, where she can do as she pleases and have better horses, too, and the more you and Nell a.s.sure her that there is no school in which she can learn without obedience, and that her horse was too good, if anything, the more determined she becomes, and soon you wisely desist.