Part 9

I should be sorry indeed to be understood to underrate the horsemanship of England. I do not suppose that the excellence and universality of the equestrianism of Englishmen has any more sincere admirer than myself. But it is true that equitation as an art exists only among the military experts of the Old Country, and that the training of English horses is not carried beyond bare mediocrity among civilians for road work. For racing or hunting, the English system is perfect. The burden of my song is that we Americans shall not too closely imitate one single English style for all purposes. If we will truly imitate the best English methods, each in its appropriate place, and not pattern ourselves solely on the fox-hunting type, we shall do well enough; though in riding, as in all the arts, it is wisest, as well as most American, to look for models in every direction, and select the best to follow. What I wish to protest against is the dragging of the hunting-field into the park, and what I wish to urge is the higher education of--horses.

One has only to go back to the thirties in England to find all the niceties of the Haute Ecole in full bloom. Not only the young swells, but the old politicians and the celebrated generals, used to go "titupping" down the Row, passaging, traversing, and piaffing to the admiration of all beholders. But the age which, in the race for the greatest good to the greatest number, has brought about simplicity in men's dress, and has reduced oratory to mere conversation; which has given the layman the right to abuse the church, and the costermonger the privilege of running down royalty, has changed all this. And as we have doubtless gone too far in many directions, in our desire to make all men free and equal, may we not have also gone too far in discarding some of the refinements of equestrianism? And is it not true, and pity, that the old-fashioned outward courtesy to women (for the courtesy of the heart, Dieu merci, always remains to us), whose decrease is unhappily so apparent to-day, and among the young is being supplanted by a mere camaraderie, is being swept from our midst by the same revulsion towards the extremely practical, which has discarded the beruffled formalities of our forebears and the high airs of equitation?

We have, in the East, been so imbued with an imitative mania of the hunting style of England, that if one rides a horse on any other than an open, or indeed an all but disjointed walk, trot, or canter, he is thought to be putting on airs, in much the same measure as if he should dress in an unwarranted extreme of fashion upon the street. But if we are to ape the English, why not permit on Commonwealth Avenue--or by and by, we trust, the Park--what is daily seen in Rotten Row? No one who has tasted it can deny the exhilarating pleasure given you by a horse who is fresh enough to bound out of the road at any instant, who conveys to you in every stride that glorious sense of power which only a generous heart as well as supple muscles ever yield, and who is yet well enough schooled to rein down to a five-mile canter, with his haunches well under him; while, though he is burning with eagerness to plunge into a gallop, he curbs his ambition to your mood, and rocks you in the saddle with that gentle combination of strength and ease to which an uneducated gait is no more to be compared than Pierce's cider (good as it is in its place) to Mumm's Cordon Rouge. When one is riding for the pleasure of riding, why not use all the art which will add zest to your pleasure, rather than aim to give the impression that you are sauntering to cover, well ahead of time, and don't want to tire your horse, because you expect to tax him severely during the day with the Myopia beagles across the pretty country near Weld Farm?

A celebrated English horseman says: "The park-hack should have, with perfection of graceful form, graceful action, an exquisite mouth, and perfect manners." "He must be intelligent, for without intelligence even with fine form and action he can never be pleasant to ride." "The head should be of the finest Oriental type; the neck well arched, but not too long." "The head should be carried in its right place, the neck gracefully arched. From the walk he should be able to bound into any pace, in perfectly balanced action, that the rider may require." And yet such a horse, though esteemed a prize in Rotten Row, would be all but tabooed on the streets of Boston, because he is not the type of a fine performer to hounds.

XXIV.

There are so many manuals of the equestrian art from which any aspiring and patient student of equitation may derive the information requisite to become an expert horseman, that beyond a few hints for the benefit of those who, like you, Tom, know nothing and want to learn a little about the niceties of horseback work, it would be presumptuous to go. If a man desires to learn how to train a horse thoroughly, he must go back to Baucher, or to some of Baucher's pupils. All the larger works which cover training contain the elements of the Baucher system. The recent work of Colonel E. L. Anderson, late of General George H. Thomas' staff, written in England and published by David Douglas of Edinburgh, is a most excellent work.

I have found as a rule that abstruse written explanations are very difficult to understand. In a recent excellent book on riding-school training (not School-riding mind you), though I know perfectly well what the riding-school volte and demi-volte are, as well as the School-volte and demi-volte, simple and reversed, I have read certain paragraphs dozens of times, without being able to make the words mean what the movement really is. Colonel Anderson's book is very clear, though it goes fully into the refinements of the art, except the quasi-circus tricks and airs, and from it, with time and patience, a man can make himself an accomplished rider and his steed equal to any work--outside the sawdust ring.

But you, Tom, do not aspire to go so far in the training of Penelope.

XXV.

You must not suppose that a man who teaches his horse all the airs of the Haute Ecole constantly uses them, any more than an eminent divine is always in the act of preaching, or a prima donna assoluta is at all times warbling or practicing chromatic scales, when each ought to be engaged in the necessary but prosaic details of life. The best results of School-training lie in the ability of the horse and rider to do plain and simple work in the best manner. Because a horse can traverse or perform the Spanish trot, his rider need not necessarily make him traverse or passage past the window of his inamorata, while he himself salutes her with the air of a grandee of Aragon. For this would no doubt be bad style for a modern horseman in front of a Beacon Street mansion; though truly it might be eminently proper, as well as an interesting display of horsemanship, for the same rider to traverse past his commanding general while saluting at a review on Boston Common. Nor because a horse can perform the reversed pirouette with perfect exactness will a School-rider stop in the middle of a park road and parade the accomplishment. But this same reversed pirouette is for all that the foundation of everything that a well-trained horse should be able to do, and if he knows it, he is ready to make use of it at all times for the greater ease, safety, and pleasure of his master.

You may ask of what use it can ever be. Suppose you were riding with a lady, on her left,--which is the safe and proper, if not the fashionable side,--and her saddle should begin to turn, say toward you, as it is most apt to do. If your horse minds the indication of your leg, you can keep him so close to your companion's as to afford her suitable assistance, even to the extent of bodily lifting her clear of her saddle. If your horse is only half trained, you cannot, perhaps, bring him to the position where you want him in season to be of any service at all. Have you never seen a man who was trying to open a gate at which a score of impatient, not to say objurgatory, riders were waiting, while the field was disappearing over the hills and far away, and who could neither get at it nor out of the way, because his crack hunter didn't know what the pressure of his master's legs meant, and fought shy of the gate, while keeping others from coming near it? Have you never stood watching a race at the Country Club, with a rider beside you whose horse took up five times the space he was entitled to, because he could not be made to move sidewise? Has not every one seen occasions when even a little training would have been a boon both to himself and his neighbors?

Talking of opening gates, one of the best bits of practice is to unlock, open, and ride through a common door and close and lock it after you without dismounting. Let it be a door opening towards you. If your horse will quickly get into and stand steady in the positions necessary to enable you to lean over and do all this handily at any door, gates will cease to have any terrors for you.

Nor must you suppose that every schooled horse is of necessity kept in his most skilled form at all times. As few college graduates of twenty years' standing can construe an ode of Horace, though indeed they may understand the purport and read between the lines as they could not under the shadow of the elms of Alma Mater, so Patroclus, for instance, is by no means as clever in the intricate steps of his School performances as he was when fresh from his education. But the result is there; and for all the purposes of actual use in the saddle, the training he has had at all times bears its fruit.

After this weary exordium of theory, Tom, for which my apologies, let us turn to a bit of practice.

XXVI.

And first about the horse himself. If you buy one, do so under such advice as to get soundness, intelligence, courage, and good temper. Our American horses, unless spoiled, generally have all these in sufficient measure, and can be made everything of. You have been exceptionally fortunate in your purchase of Penelope. She is light gaited, not long and logy in her movements, and carries her own head. She has remarkable good looks, an inestimable quality after you get performance; but beware of the May-bird which has good looks alone. She is fifteen three, nearly as high at the rump, and with tail set on right there, fine-bred, but with barrel enough to weigh about a thousand and twenty pounds. She looks like a thoroughbred hunter, Tom, every inch of her. This is a good height and weight for you, who ride pretty heavy for a youngster, and are apt soon to run up to "twel' stun eight."

You say Penelope is six years old. From five to eight is the best age, the nearer five the better. An old horse does not supple so readily. And she was well broken to harness? A good harness training is no harm to any horse, nor occasional use in light harness, whatever pride one may take in a horse which has never looked through a collar. In fact, many hunters in the Old Country are purposely used as tandem, or four-in-hand leaders during the summer, to give them light work, and bring them towards the season in firmer condition than if they had run at large and eaten their heads off. It is only the pulling or holding back of heavy weights which injures saddle gaits, and this because a saddle beast should be taught to keep his hind legs well under him, and remain in an elastic equilibrium; and dragging a load brings about the habit of extending the legs too much to the rear, while holding back gives a habit of sprawling and stiffening which is sadly at variance with a "collected" action.

XXVII.

You ask about dress. Wear anything which is usual among riders. Enamel boots as now worn are convenient to the constant rider, as the mud does not injure them as it does cloth, and water at once cleanses them. But plain dark trousers, cut a mere trifle longer than you wear them on the street, and strapped under the feet, are excellent to ride in. If cut just right they are the neatest of all gear for park riding in good weather. The simpler your dress the better. Gentlemen to-day dress in boots when riding with ladies, and fashion, of course, justifies their use now as it did fifty years ago. But within half that term, in England, a man who would ride in boots with a pretty horsebreaker considered trousers de rigeur, if he was going to the Park with his wife or daughters.

To saddle and bridle your horse, you must know your own needs and his disposition and mouth. But the English saddle and a bit and bridoon bridle, such as you have, are the simplest, and meet most wants, providing they fit the back and mouth.

We do not have to suit such varying tempers and mouths in this country as they do abroad. Our horses are singularly tractable. It is rather a stunning thing to be mounted on the fashionable type of horse who "won't stand a curb, you know,"--and there are some such,--but, as a fact, ninety-nine American horses out of one hundred will work well in a port and bridoon bridle properly adjusted.

Always buy good things. Cheap ones are dear at any price. Your saddle should fit so that when you are in it you can thrust your riding-whip under the pommel and to the cantle along the horse's backbone; otherwise you may get sore withers. The bits should hang in the mouth just above where a horse's tush grows. Penelope's sex, you see, Tom, precludes her having any.

XXVIII.

When you bought Penelope, she knew nothing of saddle work, and I told you to ride her a few times on a walk or a trot, anywhere and anyhow, so as to get used to her, and her used to you, before you began to teach her anything. She had presumably always been ridden to and from the blacksmith's shop, and worked kindly under saddle. You have got good legs, Tom, and any man with average legs can keep his seat after a fashion on a decently behaved horse. You were afraid you could not sit Penelope when you first bought her, and had not ridden for so long that you felt strange in the saddle. So I advised you to hire an old plug for a few rides until you were sure you would feel at home when you mounted her, meanwhile exercising her in harness. The better part of valor will always be discretion, now as in Falstaff's time, while the best of horses will get a bit nervous if kept long in a half-dark stable. Regular exercise is as essential to a horse as oil is to an engine, if either is to work smoothly.

You ask me the proper way to mount. Let us stop while you dismount, and I will show you the usual way. It is simple work. Stand opposite Nelly's near shoulder, a foot or so away from her, and facing towards the cantle of your saddle. Gather up your snaffle reins just tight enough to feel, but not pull on her mouth, and seize a part of her mane with your left hand. Insert your toe in the stirrup, just as it hangs, using your right hand if necessary. Then seize the cantle of the saddle with your right hand, and springing from your right foot, without touching the horse's flank with your left toe, raise yourself into the stirrup, pause a moment, and then throw the leg across the horse, moving your right hand away in season. If you were shorter, you might have to spring from your foot before you could touch the cantle. As in everything else, there are other and perhaps better ways to mount, and pages can be written upon the niceties of each method. But the above suffices for the nonce. You can choose your own fashion when you have tried them all.

An active youngster, like yourself, should be able to vault into the saddle without putting the left foot into the stirrup at all. In all Continental gymnasiums, this is one of the usual exercises, on a horse-block with imitation saddle, and is an excellent practice. By all means learn it.

XXIX.

You do not seem to hold your reins handily, Tom. Of all the methods of holding reins I prefer the old cross-country way of a generation back, still recommended, I was pleased to see, in the very excellent article "Horse" of the edition of the "Cyclopaedia Britannica" now publishing, and I fancy yet much in vogue.