"Left wheel into line!" and they
wheel and obey.
_Tennyson_.
When you arrive at the school for your second class lesson,
Esmeralda, you find the dressing-room pervaded by a silence as
clearly indicative of a recent tempest as the path cloven through
a forest by a tornado. From the shelter of screens and from
retired nooks, come sounds indicative of garments doffed and
donned with abnormal celerity and severity, but never a word of
joking, and never a cry for deft-fingered Kitty's assistance, and
then, little by little, even these noises die away, and the
palace of the Sleeping Beauty could not be more quiet. No girl
stirs from her lurking-place, until our yourself issue from your
pet corner, and then Nell, a warning finger on her lip,
noiselessly emerges from hers, and you go into the reception room
together, and she explains to you that, despite her announcement
that she would never come again, the society young lady has
appeared, and has announced her intention to defend what she
grandly terms her position as a lady.
"And the master will think us, her associates, as unruly as she
is!" Nell almost sobs. "If I were he, I would send the whole
class home, there!" But the other girls now enter, each
magnificently polite to the others, and the file of nine begins
its journey along the wall, attended as before, the society young
lady taking great pains about distance, and really doing very
well, but the beauty sitting with calm negligence which soon
brings a volley of remonstrance from both teachers, who address
her much after the fashion of Sydney Smith's saying, "You are on
the high road to ruin the moment you think yourself rich enough
to be careless."
"You must not keep your whip in contact with your horse's
shoulder all the time," lectured one of the teachers, "if you do,
you have no means of urging him to go forward a little faster.
Keep it pressed against the saddle, not slanting outward or
backward. When you use it, do it without relaxing your hold upon
the reins, for if, by any mischance, your horse should start
quickly, you will need it. Forward, ladies, forward! don't stop
in the corners! Use your whips a very little, just as you begin
to turn! Miss Esmeralda, keep to the wall! No, no! Don't keep to
the wall by having your left rein shorter than your right! They
should be precisely even."
"As you approach the corner," says the other teacher quietly,
speaking to you alone, "carry your right hand a little nearer to
your left without bending your wrist, so that your rein will just
touch your horse's neck on the right side. That will keep his
head straight."
"But he seems determined to go to the right," you object.
"That is because your right rein is too short now. While we are
going down the long side of the school, make the reins precisely
even. Now, lay the right rein on his neck, use your whip, and
touch him with your heel to make him go on; bend your right wrist
to turn him, use your whip once more, and go on again!"
"Forward, Miss Esmeralda, forward!" cries the other teacher.
"That is because Miss Lady did not go into the corner, and so is
too far in advance," your teacher explains. "You must, in class,
keep your distance as carefully when the rifer immediately before
you is wrong as when she is right. It is the necessity of doing
that, of having to be ready for emergencies, to think of others
as much as of your horse and of yourself, that give class
teaching much of its value."
"Forward, ladies, forward," cries the other teacher. "Remember
that you are not to go to sleep! Now prepare to trot, and don't
go too fast at first. Remember always to change from one gait to
another gently, for your own sake, that you may not be thrown out
of position; for your horse's, that he may not be startled, and
made unruly and ungraceful. He has nerves as well as you. Now,
prepare to trot! Trot! Shorten your reins, Miss Beauty! Shorten
them!" and during the next minute or two, while the class trots
about a third of a mile, the poor beauty hears every command in
the manual addressed to her, and smilingly tries, but tries in
vain to obey them; but in an unhappy moment the teacher's glance
falls on the society young lady and he bids her keep her right
shoulder back. "You told me that before," she says, rather more
crisply than is prescribed by any of he manuals of etiquette
which constitute her sole library.
"Then why don't you do it?" is his answer. "Keep your left
shoulder forward," he says a moment later, whereupon the society
young lady turns to the right, and plants herself in the centre
of the ring with as much dignity as is possible, considering that
her horse, not having been properly stopped, and feeling the
nervous movements of her hands, moves now one leg and now
another, now draws his head down pulling her forward on the
pommel, and generally disturbs the beautiful repose of manner
upon which she prides herself.
"You are tired? No? Frightened? Your stirrup is too short? You
are not comfortable?" demands the teacher, riding up beside her.
"Is there anything which you would like to have me do?"
"I don't like to be told to do two things at once," she responds
in a tone which should be felt by the thermometer at the other
end of the ring.
"But you must do two things at once, and many more than two, on
horseback," he says; "when you are rested, take your place in the
line."
"I think I will dismount," she says.
"Very well," and before she has time to change her mind, a bell
is rung, a groom guides her horse to the mounting-stand, the
master himself takes her out of the saddle, courteously bids her
be seated in the reception room and watch the others, and she
finds her little demonstration completely and effectually
crushed, and, what is worse, apparently without intention. Nobody
appears to be aware that she has intended a rebellion, although
"whole Fourth of Julys seem to bile in her veins."
"Now," the teacher goes on, "we will turn to the right, singly.
Turn! Keep up, ladies! Keep up! Ride straight! To the right
again! Turn!" and back on the track, on the other side of the
school, the leader in the rear, the beginners in advance, you
continue until two more turns to the right replace you.
"That was all wrong," the teacher says, cheerfully. "You did not
ride straight, and you did not ride together. Your horses' heads
should be in line with one another, and then when you arrive at
the track and turn to the right again, your distance will be
correct. Now we will have a little trot, and while you are
resting afterward, you shall try the turn again."
The society young lady, watching the scene in sulkiness, notes
various faults in each rider and feels that the truly promising
pupil of the class is sitting in her chair at that moment; but
she says nothing of the kind, contenting herself by asking the
master, with well-adjusted carelessness, if it would not be
better for the teacher to speak softly.
"It gives a positive shock to the nerves to be so vehemently
addressed," she says, with the air of a Hammond advising an
ignorant nurse.
"That is what he has the intention to do," replies the other. "It
is necessary to arouse the rider's will and not let her sleep,
but if it were not, the teacher of riding, or anybody who has to
give orders, orders, orders all day long, must speak from an
expanded chest, with his lungs full of air, or at night he will
be dumb. The young man behind the counter who has to entreat,
persuade, to beg, to be gentle, he may make his voice soft, but
to speak with energy in a low tone is to strain the vocal cords
and to injure the lungs permanently. The opera singer finds to
sing piano, pianissimo more wearisome than to make herself heard
above a Wagner orchestra. The orator, with everybody still and
listening with countenance intent, dares not speak softly, except
now and then for contrast. In the army we have three months'
rest, and then we go to the surgeon, and he examines our throats
and lungs, and sees whether or not they need any treatment. If
you go to the camp of the military this summer, you will find the
young officers whom you know in the ball-room so soft and so
gentle, not whispering to their men, but shouting, and the best
officer will have the loudest shout."
The society young lady remembers the stories which she has heard
her father and uncles tell of that "officer's sore throat," which
in 1861 and 1862, caused so many ludicrous incidents among the
volunteer soldiery, the energetic rill master of one day being
transformed into a voiceless pantomimist by the next, but, like
Juliet when she spoke, she says nothing, and now the teacher once
more cries, "Turn!" and then, suddenly, "Prepare to stop! Stop!
Now look at your line! Now two of you have your horses' heads
even! And how many of you were riding straight?"
A dead silence gives a precisely correct answer, and again he
cries, "Forward!" A repetition of the movement is demanded, and
is received with cries of "This is not good, ladies! This is not
good! We will try again by and by. Now, prepare to change hands
in file."
The leader, turning at one corner of the school, makes a line
almost like a reversed "s" to the corner diagonally opposite, and
comes back to the track on the left hand, the others straggling
after with about as much precision and grace as Jill followed
Jack down the hill; but, before they are fairly aware how very
ill they have performed the manoeuvre, they perceive that their
teacher not only aimed at having them learn how to turn to the
left at each corner, but also at giving himself an opportunity to
make remarks about their feet and the position thereof, and at
the end of five minutes each girl feels as if she were a
centipede, and you, Esmeralda, secretly wonder whether something
in the way of mucilage of thumb-tacks might not be used to keep
your own riding boots close to the saddle. "And don't let your
left foot swing," says the teacher in closing his exhortations;
"hold it perfectly steady! Now change hands in file, and come
back to the track on the right again, and we will have a little
trot."
"And before you begin," lectures the master, "I will tell you
something. The faster you go, after once you know how to stay in
the saddle, the better for you, the better for your horse. You
see the great steamer crossing the ocean when under full headway,
and she can turn how this way and now that, with the least little
touch of the rudder, but when she is creeping, creeping through
the narrow channel, she must have a strong, sure hand at the
helm, and when she is coming up to her wharf, easy, easy, she
must swing in a wide circle. That is why my word to you is always
'Forward! Forward!' and again, 'Forward!' There is a scientific
reason underlying this, if you care to know it. When you go fast,
neither you nor the horse has time to feel the pressure of the
atmosphere from above, and that is why it seems as if you were
flying, and he is happy and exhilarated as well as you. You will
see the tame horse in the paddock gallop about for his pleasure,
and the wild horse on the prairie will start and run for miles in
mere sportiveness. So, if you want to have pleasure on horseback,
'Forward!'"
While the little trot is going on, the society young lady
improves the shining hour by asking the master "if he does not
think it cruel to make a poor horse go just as fast as it can,"
to which he replies that the horse will desire to go quite as
long as she can or will, whereupon she withdraws into the cave of
sulkiness again, but brightens perceptibly as you dismount and
join her.
"You do look so funny, Esmeralda," she begins. "Your feet do seem
positively immense, as the teacher said."
"Pardon me; I said not that," gently interposes the teacher;
"only that they looked too big, bigger than they are, when she
turns them outward."
"And you do sit very much on one side," she continues to
Versatilia: "and your crimps are quite flat, my dear," to the
beauty.
"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 retard 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 companionship 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 class 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!