Chapter 2 No.2

Bring forth the horse!

Byron.

Being ready to start, Esmeralda, the question now arises: "Is a riding school," as the girl asked about the new French play, "a place to which one can take her mother?" Little girls too young to dress themselves should be attended by their mothers or by their maids, but an older girl no more needs guardianship at riding-school than at any other place at which she receives instruction, and there is no more reason why her mother should follow her into the ring than into the class-room.

Her presence, even if she preserve absolute silence, will probably embarrass both teacher and pupil, and although her own children may not be affected by it, it will be decidedly troublesome to the children of other mothers.

If, instead of being quiet, she talk, and it is the nature of the mother who accompanies her daughter to riding-school to talk volubly and loudly, she will become a nuisance, and even a source of actual danger, by distracting the attention of the master from his pupils, and the attention of the pupils from their horses, to say nothing of the possibility that some of her pretty, ladylike screams of, "Oh, darling, I know you're tired!" or, "Oh, what a horrid horse; see him jump!" may really frighten some lucky animal whose acquaintance has included no women but the sensible.

If she be inclined to laugh at the awkward beginners, and to ridicule them audibly-but really, Esmeralda, it should not be necessary to consider such an action, impossible in a well-bred woman, unlikely in a woman of good feeling! Leave your mother, if not at home, in the dressing-room or the reception room, and go to the mounting-stand alone.

In some schools you may ride at any time, but the usual morning hours for ladies' lessons are from nine o'clock to noon, and the afternoon hours from two o'clock until four. Some masters prefer that their pupils should have fixed days and hours for their lessons, and others allow the very largest liberty. For your own sake it is better to have a regular time for your lessons, but if you cannot manage to do so, do not complain if you sometimes have to wait a few minutes for your horse, or for your master.

The school is not carried on entirely for your benefit, although you will at first assume that it is. As a rule, a single lesson will cost two dollars, but a ten-lesson ticket will cost but fifteen dollars, a twenty-lesson ticket twenty-five dollars, and a ticket for twenty exercise rides twenty dollars. In schools which give music-rides, there are special rates for the evenings upon which they take place, but you need not think of music-rides until you have had at least the three lessons which you desire.

Buy your ticket before you go to the dressing-room, and ask if you may have a key to a locker. Dress as quickly as you can, and if there be no maid in the dressing-room, lock up your street clothing and keep your key. If there be a maid, she will attend to this matter, and will assist you in putting on your skirt, showing you that it buttons on the left side, and that you must pin it down the basque of your jersey or your jacket in the back, unless you desire it to wave wildly with every leap of your horse. Flatter not yourself that lead weights will prevent this! When a horse begins a canter that sends you, if your feelings be any gauge, eighteen good inches nearer the ceiling, do you think that an ounce of lead will remain stationary? give a final touch to your hairpins and hatpins, button your gloves, pull the rubber straps of your habit over your right toe and left heel, and you are ready.

In most schools, you will be made to mount from the ground, and you will find it surprisingly and delightfully easy to you. What it may be to the master who puts you into the saddle is another matter, but nine out of ten teachers will make no complaint, and will assure you that they do very well.

If you wish to deceive any other girl's inconsiderate mother whom you may find comfortably seated in a good position for criticism, and to make her suppose that you are an old rider, keep silence. Do not criticise your horse or his equipments, do not profess inability to mount, but when you master says "Now!" step forward and stand facing in the same direction of your horse, placing your right hand on the upper pommel of the two on the left of the saddle.

Set your left foot in whichever hand he holds out for it. Some masters offer the left, some the right, and some count for a pupil, and others prefer that she should count for yourself. The usual "One, two, three!" means, one, rest the weight strongly on the right foot; two, bend the right knee, keeping the body perfectly erect; three, spring up from the right foot, turning very slightly to the left, so as to place yourself sideways on the saddle, your right hand toward the horse's head.

Some masters offer a shoulder as a support for a pupil's left hand, and some face toward the horse's head and some toward his tail, so it is best for you to wait a little for directions, Esmeralda, and not to suppose that, because you know all about Lucy Fountain's way of mounting a horse, or about James Burdock's tuition of Mabel Vane, there is no other method of putting a lady in the saddle.

After your first lesson, you will find it well to practise springing upward from the right foot, holding your left on a hassock, or a chair rung, your right hand raised as if grasping the pommel, your shoulders carefully kept back, and your body straight. It is best to perform this exercise before a mirror, and when you begin to think you have mastered it, close you eyes, give ten upward springs and then look at yourself. A hopeless wreck, eh? Not quite so bad as that, but, before, you unconsciously corrected your position by the eye, and you must learn to do it entirely by feeling. You will probably improve very much on a second trial, because your shoulders will begin to be sensitive. Why not practise this exercise before your first lesson? Because you should know just how your master prefers to stand, in order to be able to imagine him standing as he really will. It is not unusual to see riders of some experience puzzled and made awkward by an innovation on what they have regarded as the true and only method of mounting, although, when once the right leg and wrist are properly trained, a woman ought to be able to reach the saddle without caring what her escort's method of assistance.

Mounting from a high horseblock is a matter of being fairly lifted into the saddle, and you cannot possibly do it improperly. it is easy, but it gives you no training for rides outside the school, and masters use it, not because they approve of it, but because their pupils, not knowing how easy it is to mount from the ground, often desire it.

But, being in the saddle, turn so as to face your horse's head, put our right knee over the pommel, and slip your left foot into the stirrup. Then rise on your left foot and smooth your skirt, a task in which your master will assist you, and take you reins and your whip from him.

How shall you hold your reins? As your master tells you! Probably, he will give you but one rein at first, and very likely will direct you to hold it in both hands, keeping them five or six inches apart, the wrists on a level with the elbows or even a very little lower, and he is not likely to insist on any other details, knowing that it will be difficult for you to attain perfection in these. An English master might give you a single rein to be passed outside the little finger, and between the forefinger and the middle finger, the loop coming between the forefinger and thumb, and being held in place by the thumb. Then he would expect you to keep your right shoulder back very firmly, but a French master will tell you that it is better to learn to keep the shoulder back a little while holding a rein in the right hand, and an American master will usually allow you to take your choice, but, until you have experience, obey orders in silence.

And now, having taken your whip, draw yourself back in your saddle so as to feel the pommel under your right knee; sit well towards the right, square your shoulders, force your elbows well down, hollow your waist a little, and start. He won't go? Of course he will not, until bidden to do so, if he know his business. Bend forward the least bit in the world, draw very slightly on the reins, and rather harder on the right, so as to turn him from the stand, and away he walks, and you are in the ring. You had no idea that it was so large, and you feel as if lost on a western prairie, but you are in no danger whatsoever. You cannot fall off while your right knee and left foot are in place, and if you deliberately threw yourself into the tan, you would be unhurt, and the riding-school horse knows better than to tread on anything unusual which he may find in his way.

Now, Esmeralda, keep your mind-No, your saddle is not turning; it is well girthed. You feel as if it were? Pray, how do you know how you would feel if a saddle were to turn? Did you ever try it? And your saddle is not too large! Neither is it too small! And there is nothing at all the matter with your horse! Now, Esmeralda, keep your mind-No, that other girl is not going to ride you down. Her horse would not allow her, if she endeavored to do so. The trouble is that she does not guide her horse, but is worrying herself about staying on his back, when she should be thinking about making him turn sharp corners and go straight forward. Regard her as a warning, Esmeralda, and keep your mind-What is the matter with the reins? Apparently they are oiled, for they have slipped from under your thumbs, and your horse is wandering along with drooping head, looking as if training to play the part of the dead warrior's charger at a military funeral.

Shorten your reins now, carefully! Not quite so much, or your horse will think that you intend to begin to trot, and do not lean backward, or he will fancy that you wish him to back or stop. The poor thing has to guess at what a pupil wishes, and no wonder that he sometimes mistakes.

But, Esmeralda, keep your mind on those thumbs and hold them close to your forefingers. Driving will give no idea of the slipperiness of leather, but after your first riding lesson you will wonder why it is not used to floor roller-skating rinks. But remember that your reins are for your horse's support, not for yours; they are the telegraph wires along which you send dispatches to him, not parallel bars upon which your weight is to depend. Hitherto, you have not ridden an inch. Your horse has strolled about, and you have not dropped from his back, and that is not riding, but now you shall begin.

In a large ring, pupils are required to keep to the wall when walking, as this gives the horse a certain guide, but in small rings the rule is to keep to the wall when trotting, so as to improve every foot of pace, and to walk about six feet from the wall, not in a circle, but describing a rectangle. New pupils are always taught to turn to the right, and to make all their movements in that direction. Hold your thumbs firmly in place, and draw your right hand a very little upward and inward, touching your whip lightly to the horse's right side, and turning your face and leaning your body slightly to the right.

The instant that the corner is turned, drop your hand, keeping the thumb in place, square your shoulders, look straight between your horse's ears, and then allow your eyes to range upward as far as possible without losing sight of him altogether. No matter what is going on about you. Very likely, the criticizing mamma on the mounting-stand is scolding sharply about noting. Possibly, a dear little boy is fairly flying about the ring on a pony that seems to have cantered out of a fairy tale, and a marvelously graceful girl, whom you envy with your whole soul, is doing pirouettes in the centre of the ring.

All that is not your business. Your sole concern is to keep your body in position, and your mind fixed on making your horse obey you, doing nothing of his own will. Stop him now and then by leaning back, and drawing on the reins, not with your body but with your hands. Then lean forward and go on, but if he should remain planted as fast as the Great Pyramid, if when started he should refuse to pay any attention to the little taps of your left heel and the touches of your whip, nay, if he should lie down and pretend to die, like a trick horse in a circus, don't cluck. No good riding master will teach a pupil to cluck or will permit the practice to pass unreproved, and riding-school horses do not understand it, and are quite as likely to start at the cluck of a rider on the other side of the ring as they are when a similar noise is made by the person on their own backs.

But now, just as you have shortened your reins for the fortieth time or so, your master rides up beside you. You told him of your little three-lesson plan, and being wise in his generation, he smilingly assented to it. "Shall we trot?" he asks, in an agreeable voice. "Shorten your reins, now! Don't pull on them! Right shoulder back! Now rise from the saddle as I count, 'One, two, three, four!' Off we go!'" You would like to know what he meant by "off!" "Off," indeed! You thought you were "off" the saddle. You have been bounced up and down mercilessly, and have gasped, "Stop him!" before you have been twice around the ring, and not one corner have you been able to turn properly. As for your elbows, you know that they have been flying all abroad, but still-it was fun, and you would like to try again. You do try again, and you would like to try again. You do try again, and, at last, you are conscious of a sudden feeling of elasticity, of sympathy with your horse, of rising when he does, and then your master looks at you triumphantly, and says: "You rose that time," and leaves you to go to some other pupil. And then you walk your horse again, trying to keep in position, and you make furtive little essays at trotting by yourself, and find that you cannot keep your horse to the wall, although you pull your hardest at his left rein, the reason being that, unconsciously, you also pull at the right rein, and that he calmly obeys what the reins tell him and goes straight forward. Then your master offers to help you by lifting you, grasping your right arm with his left hand, and you make one or two more circuits of the ring, and then the hour is over and you dismount and go to the dressing-room.

Tired, Esmeralda? A little, and you do wonder whether you shall not be a bruised piece of humanity to-morrow. Not if your flesh be as hard as any girl's should be in these days of gymnasiums, but if you have managed to bruise a muscle or to strain one, lay a bottle of hot water against it when you go to bed and it will not be painful in the morning. If, in spite of warnings, you have been so careless about your underclothing as to cause a blister, a bit of muslin saturated with Vaseline, with a drop of tincture of benzoin rubbed into it, makes a plaster which will end the smart instantly.

This is not a physician's prescription, but is hat of a horseman who for years led the best riding class in Boston, and it is asserted that nobody was ever known to be dissatisfied with its effects. Muffle yourself warmly, Esmeralda, and hasten home, for nothing is easier than to catch cold after riding. Air your frock and cloak before an open fire to volatilize the slight ammoniacal scent which they must inevitably contract in the locker, and then be as good to yourself as the hostler will be to your poor horse. That is to say, give yourself a sponge bath in hot water, with a dash of Sarg's soap and almond meal in it, rubbing dry with a Turkish towel, and then dress and go down to dinner.

Looking at your glowing face and shining eyes, your father will tell your mother that she should have gone also, but when he marks the havoc which you make with the substantial part of the meal, and sees that your appetite for dessert is twice as good as usual, he will reflect upon his butcher's and grocer's bills, and, considering what they would be with provision to make for two such voracious creatures, he will say, "No, Esmeralda, don't take your mother!"