Chapter 4

Up went the Texan's left heel, catching cleverly on the saddle as he dropped lightly to the right, after the fashion of the Arab, the Moor, the Apache, of all the nations which ride for speed and for fighting rather than for leaping and hunting, and he caught the whip from the ground and was back in his place in a twinkling. The ladies were unmoved, because inappreciative; the lawyer looked savagely envious, the cavalryman and the master approving, and Theodore, frankly admiring, but no one said anything, the little cavalcade rearranged itself, and once more moved on at a footpace until an electric car appeared.

"Ronald is like a rock," said the master, "and you need not be afraid, but I'll take this beast along in advance. He will shy, or do some outrageous thing, and he has a mouth as sensitive as the Mississippi's, and no more."

The "beast" did indeed sidle and fret and prance, and manifest a disposition to hasten to drown himself in the reservoir, beyond the reach of self-propelling vehicles, and he repeated the performance a the sight of two other cars, although evidently less alarmed than at first, but the fourth car was in charge of a kindly-disposed driver, who came to a dead stop, out of pure amiability.

This was too much for the "beast" to endure; a moving house he was beginning to regard as tolerable, but a house which stopped short and glared at him with all its windows was more than horse nature could endure, and he started for the next county to institute an inquiry as to whether such actions were to be allowed, but found himself forced to stop, and not altogether comfortable, while the master cried good-naturedly: "Go along and take care of your car. I'll take care of my horse!"

"More than some other folks can do," said the driver, with a quiet grin at the lawyer, whose angry, "Here, what are you doing!" shouted to his plunging steed, had brought all the women in the car to the front, to explain to one another that "that man was abusing his horse, poor thing."

The car glided off, and Versatilia turned to look at it; her horse stumbled slightly, jerking her wrists sharply, and but for the cavalryman's quick shifting of the reins to his right hand and his strong grasp of her reins with his left, she might have been in danger.

"Never look back," lectured the master. Esmeralda was his pupil, and he would have taken the whole centennial quadrille and all the cabinet ladies to point his moral, had he seen them making equestrian blunders. "Where your horse has been, where, he is, is the past. Look to the future, straight before you."

"The cavalryman looked back just now," Esmeralda ventured to say.

"Yes, but he turned his horse very slightly to do it, and he may do almost anything because he has a perfect seat, and is a good horseman."

"Suppose I hear something or somebody coming up behind me?"

"If it have any intelligence, it will not hurt you. If it have none, looking will do you no good. Turn out to the right as far as you can and look to the front harder than ever, so as to be ready to guide your horse and to avoid any obstacles in case he should start to run. What is the trouble with the ladies now?"

"O, dear!" cried the beauty to the society young lady, "your horse."

"What's the matter with him?" asked the other, still very stately and not turning.

"Oh! The dreadful creature has caught his tail on my horse's bit," said the beauty.

"Then you'd better take your horse's bit away," retorted the other. "My horse's eyes are not at that end of him, and he can't be expected to look at his tail."

"And you may be kicked," added the Texan. "Check him a little; there! We ought not to be so close together, and we ought to be moving a little, I think. Shall we trot again?"

Everybody assented, the cavalryman and Versatilia set off, the others followed as best they might, the beauty "going to pieces" in a minute or two, according to the master, the society young lady stiffening visibly, losing the cadence of the trot very soon, but making no outcry as she was tossed about uncomfortably, and not bending her head to look at her reins, as Versatilia did.

"There's the advantage of training in other things," said the master. "She's a good dancer and a good amateur actress, and she is controlling herself as she would on a ballroom floor, and remembering the spectators as she would on the stage. She's no rider, but is perfectly selfish and self-possessed, and she will cheat her escort into thinking that she is one. Glad she's no pupil of mine, however! She always heads the conversation, one of her friends told me the other day. That is to say, she is always acting. I can't teach such a person anything; nobody can. She can teach herself, as she can think of herself and love herself, but she can't go outside of herself--and the lawyer will find it out after he has married her."

Esmeralda and Theodore stared in astonishment.

"Walk," said the master, noticing that his pupil looked too warm for comfort, and the three allowed the others to go on without them. "Careful," he added, and Esmeralda, adjusting herself studiously, asked: "Is it really easier to ride on the road than it is in the school? It seems so."

"It is a little, especially if the corners of the ring are so near together that the horse goes in a circle, for then the rider has to lean to the right, while on the road she may sit straight. Give me the right kind of horse for my pupil to ride, and I would as leif give lessons on the road as anywhere, but it is not well for the pupil, whose attention is distracted by a thousand things, and who learns less in a year than she would in a month in school. There is no finish about the riding of a woman so taught. She may be pretty, as you said of one of your friends, she may be self-possessed, like the other, but she will betray her ignorance every moment. You were surprised just now at what I said of the society young lady. A woman can't cheat an old riding-master, after he has seen her in the saddle. He knows her and her little ways by heart. Shall we start up? Ah!"

Ronald, the "steady as a rock," was off and away at a canter; Theodore was starting to gallop in pursuit, but was sharply ordered back by the master, who went on himself at a rather slow canter, ready to break into a gallop if his pupil were thrown, but keeping out of Ronald's hearing, lest he should be further startled by finding himself followed. There was a clear stretch of road before her, and Esmeralda sat down as firmly as possible, brought her left knee up against the pommel, clung firmly with her right knee, held her hands low and her thumbs as firm as possible, and thought very hard.

"Very soon," she said to herself, "I shall be thrown and dragged, and hat a figure I shall be going home, if I', not killed! But I sha'n't be! I shall be ridiculous, and that's worse." Here she swept by the riding party, but as Versatilia and the beauty turned to look at her, and forgot to control their horses, the cavalryman and the Texan had to do it for them, and could do nothing for Esmeralda except to shout "Whoa," which Ronald very properly disregarded. The master came up, and the society young lady addressed him with, "Very silly of her to try to exhibit herself so, isn't it?"

"That's no exhibition; that's a runaway," said the master grimly. "She's doing well too, poor girl," and he and Theodore went on after the flying rider. Two or three carriages, the riders staring with horror; a pedestrian or two, innocently wondering why a lady should be on the road alone; a small boy whistling shrilly; these were all the spectators of Esmeralda's flight. She felt desolate and deserted, and yet sure that it was best that she should be alone, since the master could overtake her if he would, and she wondered if she should be very seriously injured when thrown at last, but all the time she was talking to Ronald in a voice carefully kept at a low pitch, and her hands were held with a steadiness utterly new to them, and the good horse went on regularly, but faster and faster.

"That isn't a real runaway," said the master to himself. "Ah, I see! Her whip is down and strikes him at every stride, and so she unconsciously urges him forward. If there were a side road here, I'd gallop around and meet her, or if there were fields on either side, I'd leap the fence and make a circuit and cut her off, but through this place, with banks like a railway cutting on each side, there is nothing to do."

Swifter and swifter! Esmeralda began to feel weaker, thought of Theodore, and of some other things of which she never told even him, said a little prayer, but all the time remembered her master's injunctions, and kept her place firmly, waiting for the final, and, as she believed, inevitable crash, when lo! She saw that just in front of her lay a long piece of half-mended road, full of ugly little stones, and she turned Ronald on it, with a triumphant, "See how you like that, sir," and then sawed his mouth. In half a minute he was walking. In another the master was beside her with words of approval. Theodore galloped up, pale and anxious, and between the two she had quite as much praise as was good for her, and, being told of the position of the whip, found her confidence in Ronald restored.

"But you should never start up hastily," said the master. "Take time for everything, and check your horse the instant he goes faster than you mean to have him. You are a good girl, and you shall not be scolded, or snubbed, either," he muttered, and the party came up, the cavalryman and the Texan loud in praise, the other four clamorous with questions and advice.

"You look quite disheveled," said the society young lady agreeably.

"Ladies often do after they have been on the road a little while. Excuse me, but one of your skirt buttons is unfastened," said the master, and, not knowing how to pass her reins into her right hand so as to use her left to repair the accident, the society young lady was effectually silenced, while the master, holding Esmeralda's horse, made her wipe her face, arrange the curly locks flying about her ears, readjust her hat, and generally smooth her plumage, until she was once more comfortable.

After a little, the master proposed a trot up the hill, and instructed Esmeralda to lean forward as her horse climbed upward, "If you should have to trot down hill, lean back a little, and keep your reins short," he said.

The lawyer and the society young lady, essaying to descend the next hill brilliantly, barely escaped going over their horses' heads, and all four ladies were glad when they perceived that they were going homeward.

"I like it," Esmeralda said to the master, "but I wish I knew more, and I'm going to learn, and I see now that three lessons isn't enough, even for a beginning."

"I knew a girl who took seventeen lessons and then was thrown," said the society young lady. "Native ability is better than teaching. I don't believe any master could make a rider of you, Esmeralda."

"A good teacher can make a rider out of anyone who will study," said the master, to whom she looked for approval. "As for seventeen lessons, they are better than seven, of course, but they are not much, after all. How many dancing lessons, music lessons, elocution lessons have you taken? More than seventeen? I thought so. Here's a railroad bridge, but no train coming. Had one been approaching, and had there been no chance to cross it before it came, I should have made you turn Ronald the other way, Miss Esmeralda, so that if he ran he would run out of what he thinks is danger, and not into it. And now for an easy little trot home."

An easy little trot it was, and Esmeralda, left at her own door, where a groom waited to take her horse to the stable, was happy, but puzzled. "Theodore," she cried, as soon as he appeared in the evening, "did you ask the master to go with us? He treated me just as he does in school."

"Yes, I did," said Theodore boldly. "I was afraid to take charge of you alone. That was a 'road lesson.'"

"You--you--exasperating thing!" cried Esmeralda. "But then, you were sensible."

"That's tautology," said Theodore.

VI.

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."