A solitary horseman might have been seen.
_G.P.R. James_.
And so you are feeling very meek after your road lesson and your
runaway, Esmeralda, and are a perfect Uriah Heep for 'umbleness,
and are, henceforth and forever, going to believe every syllable
that your master utters, and to obey every command the instant
that it is given, and--there, that will do! And you are going
to take one private lesson so as to learn a few little things
before you display your progress before any other pupils again?
One private lesson! Did your master advise it? No-no, but he
consented to give it, when you had persuaded him that it would be
best for you? When you had persuaded him? Behold the American
pupil's definition of obedience: to follow commands dictated by
herself! However, there is no use in trying to eradicate the
ideas bequeathed and fostered by a hundred years of national
self-government, so go to the school at the hour when no other
pupils are expected.
The horses pace very solemnly around the great ring, and you
adjust yourself with wonderful dignity, feeling that your master
must perceive by your improved carriage and by the general
perfection of your aspect that your exquisite timidity and
charming shyness have been responsible for your awkwardness in
former lessons, when other pupils were present, but now he leaves
your side and takes a position in the centre of the ring, whence
he addresses you thus:
"Keep your reins even! The right ones are too short, the left too
long! Stop him! That is not stopping him! He took two steps
forward after he checked himself. Go forward, and try again when
I tell you. Stop! Not so hard, not so hard! You are making him
back! Extend your arms forward! There! A little more, and you
would have made him rear! Whoa! Wo-ho! Now listen! Not so! Don't
drop your reins in that way, and sit so carelessly that a start
would throw you from your place! Never leave your horse to
himself a second! Sit as well as you can, look between your
horse's ears and listen! Always use some discretion in choosing
your place to stop. Do not try to stop when turning a corner,
even to avoid danger, but rather change your direction. In the
ring, never stop on the track, unless in obedience to your
masters order, but turn out into the centre, but when you have
once told your horse to stop, make him do it, for his sake, as
well as for your own, if you have to spend an hour in the effort.
And it will be an hour well spent, so that you need not lose
patient, and if you do lose it, do not allow your horse to
perceive it.
"To stop, you should press your leg and your whip against your
horse's sides; lift your hands a very little, and turn them in
toward your body, lean back and draw yourself up. There are six
things to do: two to your horse, one on each side of him, two
with your hands and two with your body, and you must do them
almost simultaneously. Unless you do the first two, your horse
will surely take a forward step or two after stopping, in order
to bring himself into a comfortable position. If you do not cease
doing the last four the moment that your horse has stopped, he
may rear or he may back several steps, and he should never do
that, but should await an order for each step. Now, do you
remember the six things? Very well! Go forward! Stop! Did I tell
you to do anything with your arms? No> Well, why did you bring
your elbows back of your waist, then? It is allowable to do that
--to save your life, but not to stop your horse. Bend your hands
at the wrist, turning the knuckles, if need be, until they are at
right angles with their ordinary position, so that the back of
your hand is toward your horse's ears, but keep the thumb
uppermost all the time.
"Now, think it over a moment! Go forward! Stop! Pretty well! Go
on! Don't lean forward too much when you start, and sit up again
instantly.
"Now walk around the school once, and go into all the corners.
Stop! You stopped pretty well, but you leaned back too far, and
you did not draw yourself up at all. Mind, you draw 'yourself'
up; you don't try to pull the bit up through the corners of your
horse's mouth. What I wanted to say was that a turn is just half
a stop as far as your hands, leg and whip are concerned. To turn
to the right, use your right hand and whip, but keep your left
leg and hand steady; to turn to the left, use your left leg and
hand and keep your whip and whip hand steady. When you turn to
the right, lean to the right instead of backward; 'lean,' not
twist to the right, and turn your head to the right so as to see
what may be there.
"If you were on the road, and did not turn your head before going
down a side street, you might knock over a bicycle rider, and
thereby hurt your horse, which would be a pity," he says, with
apparent indifference as to the bicycle rider's possible
injuries. "Now go around the school again. Left shoulder forward!
Right shoulder back! Sit to the right! Lean to the left! I told
you to sit to the left, the other day? And that is the reason
that I have told you to sit to the right to-day. You over-do it.
Miss Esmeralda, if I were talking for my own pleasure, I should
say pretty things to you, but I am talking to teach you, and when
I say 'This is wrong! This is wrong!' and again 'This is wrong!'
I do it for you, not for myself. When your father and mother say
'This is wrong; you must not do it, or you will be sorry,' you do
not look at them as if you thought them to be unreasonable--or,
I trust that you do not," he adds, mentally. "Heaven only knows
what an American girl may do when anybody says, 'You must not' to
her.
"Now," he goes on aloud, "it is the same with your teacher; he
says 'You are wrong,' lest you should be sorry by and by, and he
is patient and says it many times, as your father and mother do,
and he says it every time that you do anything wrong, unless you
do so many wrong things at once that he cannot speak of each one.
Now you shall turn to the right, and remember that a turn is half
a stop. Go across the school and then turn to the left! Keep a
firm hold on your right rein now so as to keep your horse close
to the wall. Where, where are your toes? It was not necessary to
make you turn so as to see your right foot through your riding
habit as I can now, to know that they were pointing outward. Your
right shoulder told the story by drooping forward. M. de Bussigny
lays especial stress on this point in his manual, and you will
find that your whole position depends more on that seemingly
unimportant right foot than on many other things, so bend your
will to holding it properly, close against the saddle. Walk on
now, keeping on a straight line. If you cannot do it in the
school, you cannot on the road, and many an ugly scrape against
walls, horse-cars, and other horses you will receive unless you
can keep to the right and in a straight line. Now turn to the
left, and go straight across the school. Straight! Fix your eye
on something when you start, and ride at it with as much
determination as if it were a fence; now you turn to the right
again and go forward. Have you read Delsarte?"
No, you murmur to yourself, you have not read Delsarte, and, if
you had, you do not believe that you could remember it or
anything else just at present. What an endless string of
directions! You wish that there was another pupil with you to
take the burden of a few of them! You wish you were--oh!
Anywhere. This is your obedience, is it Esmeralda? Well, you
don't care! This is dull! Your horse thinks so, too. He gently
tries the reins, and, finding that you offer no resistance, he
decides to take a little exercise, and starts off at a canter,
keeping away from the wall most piously, avoiding the corners as
if some Hector might be in ambuscade there to catch and tame him,
and rushing on faster and faster, as you do nothing in particular
to stop him.
"Lean to the right," cries the master, and you obey, but the
horse continues his canter, almost a gallop now, when suddenly
your wits return to you, you draw back first the right hand and
then the left, he begins to trot, and by some miracle you begin
to rise, and continue to do it, you do not know exactly how,
feeling a delight in it, an exhilarating, exultant sensation as
if flying. "Keep your right leg close to the saddle below the
knee and turn your toes in!" You obey, and even remember to press
your left knee to the saddle also and to keep your heel down.
"Don't rise to the left! Rise straight! Your horse is circling to
the right, and you must lean to the right to rise straight! Take
him into the corners so that he will move more on a straight
line, and you can rise straight and be as much at ease as if on
the road. Whoa! Now, don't change your position, but look at
yourself! You did not shorten your reins when you began to trot,
and, if your horse had stumbled, you could not have aided him to
regain his balance. Had you shortened them properly, you could,
by sitting down, using your leg and whip lightly and turning your
hands toward your body, have brought him down to a walk without
hurling yourself forward against the pommel in that fashion. Now,
adjust yourself and your reins, and start forward once more," and
you obey, and are beginning to flatter yourself that your master
does not know that your canter was accidental, when he warns you
against allowing a horse to do anything unbidden.
"You should have stopped him at once," he says. "He will very
likely try to repeat his little maneuver in a few minutes. When
he does, check him instantly, not by your voice, but as you have
been directed. And now, have you read Delsarte? No? If you have
time, you might read a chapter or two with advantage, simply for
the sake of learning that a principle underlies all attitudes.
"He divides the body into three parts; the head, torso, and legs,
and he teaches that the first and third should act on the same
line, while the second is in opposition to them. For instance, if
you be standing and looking toward the right, your weight should
rest on your right leg and your torso should be turned to the
left. Neither turn should be exaggerated, but the two should be
exactly proportioned, one to another.
"Now for riding, your body is divided into three parts, your head
and torso making one, your legs above the knee, the second, and
your legs below the knee, the third, and you will find that the
first and third will act together, whether you desire it or not.
Your right foot is properly placed now, but turn its toes outward
and upward; you see what becomes of your right shoulder. Now try
to make a circle to the right, a volte we call it, because it is
best to become accustomed to a few French words, as there are
really no English equivalents for many of the terms used in the
art of equestrianism.
"To make a volte you have only to turn to the right and to keep
turning, going steadily away from the wall until opposite your
starting point, and then regaining it by a half-circle. Making
voltes is not only a useful exercise, showing your horse that you
really mean to guide him, and teaching you to execute a movement
steadily, but it affords an excellent way of diverting the
horse's attention from the mischief which Satan is always ready
to find for idle hoofs. Give him a few voltes and he forgets his
plans for setting off at a canter. Do you understand? Very well.
When you are half-way down the school try to make a volte. I will
give you no order. Your horse would understand if I did and would
begin the movement himself, and you should do it unaided."
You try the volte, and convince yourself that the geometry master
who taught you that a circle was a polygon with an infinite
number of sides was more exact and less poetical than you thought
him in the days before the riding-school began to reform your
judgment on many things. You are conscious of not making a
respectable curve in return, and you draw a deep breath of
disgust as you say, "That was very bad, wasn't it?"
"Not for the first time. Keep your left hand and leg steady, and
try it again on the other side of the ring. Better! Now walk
around, and make him go into the corners, if you have to double
your left wrist in doing it, but don't move your arm, and when
you begin to bend you right wrist to turn, straighten your left,
and remember to lean your body and turn your head, if you want
your horse to turn his body. Your wrist acts on his head and
keeps him in line; your whip and leg bring his hind legs under
him, but you must move your body if you want him to move his.
"Now, you shall make a half volte, or shall 'change hands,' as it
is sometimes called, because, if you start with your left hand
nearest the wall, you will come back to the wall with your right
hand nearest to it; or, to speak properly, 'if you start on the
right hand of the school, you will end on the left hand.' For the
half volte, make a half circle to the right, and then ride in a
diagonal line to a point some distance back on your track, and
when you are close to it make three quarters of a turn to the
left and you will find yourself on the left of the school, and in
a position to practice keeping your horse to the right. Try it,
beginning about two thirds of the way down the long side of the
school. Now to get back to the right hand, you may turn to the
left across the school, and turn to the left again.
"There is a better way of dong it, but that is enough for to-day.
Walk now. Do you see how much better your horse carries himself,
and how much better you carry your hands, after those little
exercises? Now you must try and imagine yourself doing them over
and over and over again, to accustom your mind to them, just as
when learning to play scales and five-finger exercises you used
to think them out while walking. Shall you not need pictures and
diagrams to assist you? Not if you have as much imagination as
any horsewoman should have. Not if you have enough imagination to
manage a cow, much more to enter into the feelings of a good
horse. Pictures are invaluable to the stupid; they benumb and
enervate the clever, and turn them into apish imitators, instead
of making them able to act from their own knowledge and volition.
Theory will not make you a good rider, but a really good rider
without theory is an impossibility, and your theory must have a
deeper seat than your retinae. Now, you shall have a very little
trot, and then you may walk for ten minutes, and try to do voltes
and half voltes by yourself, asking me for aid if you cannot
remember how to execute the movements. Doing them will help you
to pass away the time when you are too tired to trot, and will
keep you from having any dull moments."
And you, Esmeralda, you naughty girl! You forgot all about your
sulkiness half an hour ago, and, looking your master in the face,
you say: "But nobody ever has dull moments in riding-school."
There! Finish your lesson and walk off to the dressing-room; you
will be trying to trade horses with somebody the next thing, you
artful, flattering puss!