THE EPIC OF THE HORSE
Rensslaer had taken half-a-dozen tickets for the Royal day, and any
special shows that he thought would appeal to Gay. Tom Bulteel had
liberally provided for the Harness classes, Carlton had concentrated
on the Trotting, Chris on the jumping, which came last in the
evening, so that the united tickets practically covered everything
worth seeing at Olympia.
The little party, Gay, Effie, and Tom Bulteel (save when the latter
were at Epsom), Lossie, Chris, and Carlton, took the Show easily,
like a picnic, saw most of the good things, and missed those not so
good, though when the jumping was on, Chris remained glued to his
seat, deaf, blind, and oblivious to all around him, save what was
passing in the arena.
The Professor had been invited, but declined--to the immense relief
of everybody, as his squeals might have astounded the neighbours
during the high jumping. Gay found it delightful not to have to be
told after squeezing in (as happened to many other of her friends),
that their cards admitted them to the building only, and seats must
be booked inside, of which there were none to be booked.
The stables amused her immensely. She thought it must have
astonished the cart horses to find themselves ensconced between
draperies of crimson and gold, others in a delicate shade of pearly
blue, with huge baskets of flowers floating over their heads, or in
bowers of hothouse blooms, and upholstered in green and white--the
whole scheme changed to a royal blue on the day of the King's visit.
The woodwork of Rensslaer's boxes was plainly but handsomely covered
in cloth, while each horse's name and its record appeared over its
stall in an ornamental gilt frame.
Several of the Continental army officers in their bright uniforms
strolled between the arena and the stables, chatting and keeping an
eye on their splendid mounts, and Gay noted approvingly that these
men seemed to be the personal friends of their horses. The tall,
clean-limbed animals, although they treated the stablemen with
contempt, pricked up their ears, and thrust their proudly-poised
heads over the stall doors, every time one of the well-known uniforms
came near.
It was a quaint sight to see the women in their delicate summer gowns
walking past the stalls over the dusty asphalt floors, and peering
into the horse-boxes, for an extraordinary number of women were
present, every one of whom had apparently put on her costliest
clothes for the occasion.
The fact that the Epsom Meeting was not over, appeared to have no
effect on the attendance, for faces well-known in the world of sport
were to be seen--it was an "indoor Ascot"--Ascot Cup Day so far as
the dresses were concerned, mingled with the paddock on Derby Day,
with its multiplicity of languages--Ascot with magnificent horses,
and instead of racing on the flat, jumping, trotting, and tandem
driving.
The gowns showed fairly well in the Ambassadors and other boxes, but
Lossie justly complained that it was like a too dense wood, where you
can't admire the foliage for the trees, and that every woman requires
a special clearing to herself to be shown off properly, which she
certainly had not here.
Yet Lossie herself easily made her presence felt in the immediate
vicinity, and drew many an envious glance on her exquisite harmony in
blue, and bluer eyes, though Gay's frock of white worked muslin, with
a great cluster of crimson roses at her girlish breast, appealed to
both Carlton and Chris far more.
But as usual in the quartette made by the young people, it was to
Lossie that Carlton fell, and very content and lovely the girl looked
as she sat beside him, while on his part, he did not find it
difficult to make himself pleasant to her, even if Gay apparently had
forgotten her quarrel with Chris, laughed, and was happy. The two
criticised everything, and discussed with zest the charming _coup
d'œil_ presented, which was vivid, and full of interest, life and
colour.
Overhead, the rays of the sun streamed through the glass roof, and
were caught by the festoons and panels, ornamented with the flags and
heraldry that emphasised the international nature of the show; roses
in long, drooping curves connected the chief parts of the
ornamentation, so that there was not one bare, unsightly piece of
woodwork in all the vast building to offend the eye, and beneath, the
Belgian landscape gardeners had worked marvels, creating a veritable
fairyland of delight.
May trees in full blossom, a fresh green lawn, flower-beds, shrubs,
everything possible to banish the show-ring, if scarcely to suggest
the paddock or hunting-field, had been done, and beyond a ring banked
with marguerites and scarlet geraniums, rose row upon row, English,
French, Belgian, and American women, tiny splashes of colour that
mostly represented the hopes and fears, impending pride or
disappointment in the horsemen who competed for their countries'
honour.
The pink hunting-coats or uniforms of the riders, the picturesque
dress of the attendants, and the sleek, shining horses, all blended
into a picture perfectly harmonious in tone, while the black coats of
the little group of tall, well-bred men in the arena who acted as
judges, somehow struck a note of distinction in the midst of the
uniforms, and the gay kaleidoscopic surroundings.
Horse shows in England are apt to be too leisurely
entertainments--this was too rapid for many spectators, for the
expedition with which everything was carried out in the ring, was a
revelation in expert management. Seeing that in one jumping class
there were a hundred and twenty entries, it was clear that only by
the full-tilt methods of the old tournament, could the events be
carried through in time, so when one competition was over, a blast on
the coach-horn, and, hey presto! the great doors at the end of the
hall flew open, and in swept the next competitors, and jumping or
other apparatus vanished as if by magic. There was a neatness and
despatch about the whole affair that made the show go as quickly as a
well-arranged theatrical performance, though the noise caused by the
joint efforts of Lord Lonsdale's band, and the liveried youth in the
ring occasionally provoked some amusement.
The vivacity of the scene was undeniable, but Gay, like many others,
experienced the greatest difficulty in identifying any particular
competition when two or more classes were in the ring, and when
afterwards she tried to remember the right sequence of the things
that most delighted her, she was not able to, so rapidly had they
succeeded each other. She remembered vividly Rensslaer's beautiful
little Peter and Mary, under eleven hands, and to her one of the
prettiest sights was when a tiny Shetland pony only seventeen inches
high, took a prize in a class with big horses, quality, not quantity,
winning, the attendant having to kneel down to pin the rosette on the
tiny creature.
The tandem teams that moved like clockwork delighted her, and she
shared Chris's admiration for the Stansfield Cottin Battak ponies,
that bred in Sumatra, with handsome heads set on high-crested necks,
full of spirit, and simply balls of muscle, had all the fire and
beauty conferred by the Arab strain, together with the hardness and
endurance of the Battak breed, the description "miniature Arabs, with
more bone than their ancestors" fitting them exactly.
She loved the magnificent team of Suffolk Punches that appeared
precisely as they do in the field, in harness adopted from all time
by Suffolk agriculturists, drawing an old-fashioned Suffolk wagon,
while the fact that they were led by men in smock frocks instead of
being driven, and thus perfectly in character, and representative of
"Old England," appealed strongly to the public, who cheered them to
the echo.
With perfect simplicity the Suffolk farm hands demonstrated how heavy
horses harnessed in twos, may be made to wheel in mazy figures by
just talking to them. In true old country style, the man walking
beside the leading animal, shouted in broad Suffolk his commands to
him, "t'other waa," and "th' iver waa" (my way), the man walking
beside the third horse repeating the commands, and at every order,
round came the four in perfect style, not a hand on their harness to
steady or lead them, wheeling their great wagon in wonderful
evolutions, amid thunders of applause that would not be silenced.
From the horse-lover's point of view, the horses for mail and other
phaetons was a noteworthy event, and closely watched by Tom Bulteel.
A most stirring competition of the nation was seen in the pairs. Mr.
Vanderbilt entered three teams; Rensslaer drove his own horses, and
the French appointments, for which 50 per cent. of the marks are
given, were extremely smart. Such a show of pairs, or anything like
it, had never been collected in any ring; indeed, said the experts,
never had so perfect a class been brought together, and the work of
the judges was herculean. The excitement was intense as the
twenty-two were reduced to a select eight, including two of
Rensslaer's, two of Mr. Vanderbilt's, and one of Mr. Bates'.
Lossie ever after viewed Rensslaer with more respect as the owner of
the superb pair of carriage horses, named after a couple of popular
sporting peers, that never appeared without creating a furore of
admiration--she would above all things have liked them for her own,
and Carlton to sit with her behind them.
He on his part viewed them with indifference, but gave unstinted
praise to the class for American Trotters with records of 2.30 or
better; fleet as Atlanta, slenderly beautiful as greyhounds, they
were a revelation to him of what a horse could look and be, and he
and Gay laughed heartily as they compared them with the quadrupeds
that in all seriousness they had called Trotters, and he understood
better now Rensslaer's prejudice against the sport as practised in
England.
"By Jove!" exclaimed Chris, "he _can_ drive!" as Rensslaer, for some
time last of the competitors, crept up to the front, Storm Cloud
beating them by the way he went round the very small turns at top
speed, passing Sensation, and thus forcing the other to a break, and
afterwards, when he had won, being driven round at full speed with
his checker-rein, and over-draw bit taken off, so as to show what
manners he had.
This was the same horse that displayed great speed in a pair in the
parade before the King, being the only pair capable of taking their
turns fast.
Yes, Gay decided _that_ was her favourite day, when the sweetest and
loveliest lady in all the land, sat with the King in the Royal box,
and frankly showed her love for horses by the delight she evinced in
their performances, and the frequent applause she gave them, laughing
as heartily as Gay did, at the humours of the donkeys in the coster's
show.
As if in answer to Tom Bulteel's pertinent remark that the saddle
classes could not be satisfactorily judged, unless the judges took a
turn in the saddle, one of them, himself a consummate horseman, rode
the chargers in turn to judge of their capacities, and the public
applauded loudly when he mounted Rensslaer's bay roan gelding, a
charger so perfectly trained in the pretty action and deportment of
the _Haute École_, that it performed a step-dance with all the
precision possible in a creature with four legs.
Gay declared that horses, like children, have an inborn tendency to
dance to the sound of music--_not_ horses trained to the _Haute
École_ either--and that in their grace and tapering limbs, they made
her think of some exquisite exponents of the ballet, as compared with
the unwieldy bodies and heavy legs of ordinary clumsy human beings.
It interested Gay to watch these men, the keenest judges of
horse-flesh, and riding and driving in the world, who chatted
quietly, nodded appreciatively now and then, criticised, admired,
condemned, evincing no concern when a frightened horse scattered them
to right and left. She was greatly amused at a big, striding bay
horse named "Teetotaler" that, though built on galloping lines,
proved himself inferior to "Whisky," who made short work of his
opponent in the 15 stone class; then there was a Belgian horse named
"Timber-topper" that thoroughly lived up to his name.
Tom Bulteel found much to admire in the horse and gig class, a purely
American affair, that being rather a novelty in this country, was
greatly approved, but laughed heartily when, in a four-in-hand class,
the coachman had to have assistance to turn his leaders in the ring.
He naturally took keen interest in the park teams, which, supported
by the Four-in-hand and Coaching Clubs, by private individuals and
professionals, ensured the judging being watched with the closest
attention. Then there were Mr. Vanderbilt's famous team of greys,
which he drove himself, though it was only by a shade that he wrested
the prize from the well-known browns of the Old Brighton Coach--an
English turn-out that gradually absorbed most of the audience's
attention, and whose driver, though he lost the blue rosette, was
greeted with loud and prolonged applause.
"Where is your motor-car now?" cried Gay triumphantly to Lossie.
"Talk of a chauffeur indeed--as if his finest, most daring and
sustained feat, could rival the sympathetic dexterity shown a hundred
times here by English and American whips!"
"Just as no rivalry between mechanical contrivances can hold a candle
to the struggle among the field of beautiful high-bred horses,
sweeping over the turf towards the winning-post," said Chris, "for in
the mechanical contrivance, the driver is the only sentient element,
in horse-racing there is both horse and jockey to reckon with, and
the animal enters into the spirit of the contest just as keenly as
his rider."
Inconsistent Gay frowned, and turned her head away, devoting herself
to Tom Bulteel, who did not want her. He was intently watching the
class for a quick change of four-in-hands, marks being given for the
speed and swiftness with which the harnessing and unharnessing was
managed, as well as for the eight horses and the horsemanship, and
some extraordinarily smart work was being done, which he fully
appreciated.
Effie, watching the game, sighed, for Gay's spirits and temper varied
with every succeeding hour, the "class" witnessed, being the
barometer by which her emotions were set. When there was only
driving, and Chris's attention entirely given to her, she sparkled,
and was happy; when jumping was on, and he became absolutely
engrossed in his favourite passion, leaning forward, his soul in his
eyes, and his eyes where his body panted to be, Gay existed no more
for him than that vast circle of spectators of which he formed a
part, and her brightness was eclipsed. Then Carlton scored--he had
not watched Gay and her attitude towards Chris during the progress of
the Show for nothing, and each day saw his hopes rise higher,
Lossie's fell.
To Effie, who was a shrewd observer, this was something more than a
great Horse Show, it was the picturesque _mise en scène_ for the
playing out of the comedy (or tragedy) of four lives, and of which
she, and unhappy Lossie clearly foresaw the end.... Chris and wilful
Gay were throwing away their happiness with both hands, and much as
she loved them both, she was powerless to prevent it.