Patroclus and Penelope Part 9

XLV.

It is often alleged by old cross-country riders that the best hunters land on their hind feet. Many no doubt land so quickly and so well gathered that they give to the eye the appearance of so doing. But I doubt if photography would really show them to land other than on one fore foot, instantly relieved by the second one planted a short stride farther on, and followed by the corresponding hind ones in succession.

Plate XIV. shows what I mean, and the same thing appears in all the Muybridge photographs. But your eye can by no means catch Patroclus in this position. His hind legs seem to follow his fore legs much more closely; and he always lands cleverly and so well gathered as to make not the slightest falter in his new stride. It is also said that the best water-jumpers skim and do not rise much to the jump. But I fancy that every horse rises more to water than the fancy drawn pictures show. Gravitation alone, it seems, would make this necessary.

Photography would prove the fact, but there are probably not enough such photographs extant to-day to decide upon the question.

You may read a dozen volumes about jumping, Tom, but a dozen jumps will teach you a dozen times as much as the printer's ink. And remember that a standing or an irregular jump, even if small, or that the leap of a pony, is harder to sit than a well-timed jump of twice the dimensions on a full grown horse. I have been nearly dismounted in teaching a new horse much oftener than in the hunting-field. It is only when your horse comes down, or when a bad jumper rushes at his fence and then swerves or refuses suddenly, that there is any grave danger of a fall in riding to hounds.

Don't be afraid of a fall. It won't hurt you much in nineteen cases out of twenty. If you find you are really going and can't save yourself, don't stiffen. Try to flop, the more like a drunken man the better. It is rigid muscles which break bones. This is a hard rule to learn. Many falls alone teach its uses. A suggestion will by no means do so. But hold on to your reins for your life, Tom, when you fall.

This is one of the most important things to remember. It has saved many a man from being dragged.

A man who brags that he has never had a fall may be set down as having never done much hard riding. Many a time and oft have the very best riders and their steeds entered the next field in Tom Noddy's order:

Tom Noddy 1.

T. N.'s b.g. Dan 2.

And yet how few bones there are broken for the number of falls. A good shaking up is all there is to it, as a rule. When a man mellows into middle life--(how much farther on in years middle life is when we are well past forty than when we are twenty-five!)--he is apt to feel discreet, because conscious that a bad spill may hurt him worse than in his youth, and he will look upon a "hog-backed stile" as a thing requiring a deal of deliberation, if not a wee bit jumping-powder. He will avoid trying conclusions whenever he can. But at your age and with your legs, on that mare of yours, Tom, you should go anywhere, if she will learn to jump cleverly.

Your feet should be "home" in the stirrups, and you will naturally throw them slightly backward as you hold on, toes down, because it both gives you the better grip and keeps your stirrup on your foot. In this particular, Tom, I bid you heed my precept, and not study my example, which is by no means of the best, as I am reduced to jumping with a straight leg, and to fastening my stirrup to my foot, lest I should not find it when I land.

XLVI.

The Englishman's method and seat for cross-country riding is undeniably the best, and perhaps is hardly to be criticised. But a good seat or hands for hunting are not necessarily good for all other saddle work. That firmness in the saddle which will take a man over a five-foot wall may not be of the same quality as will give him absolutely light hands for School-riding. For as a rule, Englishmen prefer hunters who take pretty well hold of the bridle, and work well up to the bit. And for this one purpose, perhaps they are right. Such a hold will not, however, teach a man the uses of light hands in the remotest degree.

In a sharp run to hounds, a horse must have his head. For high pace or great exertions of mere speed, the horse must be free. A twitch on the curb may check him at a jump and give him a bad fall. As in racing, a horse has to learn that his duty is to put all his courage, speed, and jumping ability into his work, subject only to discreet guidance and management. But on the road, the exact reverse should be the rule.

There is surely less enjoyment in your Penelope, who to-day can only walk, or else go a four-minute gait without constant friction, than there will be when she can vary her gaits and keep up any desired rate of speed, from a walk to a fifteen-mile trot or a sharp gallop, at the least intimation of your hands and without discomfort to herself. I know of nothing more annoying than to be forced by a riding companion of whichever s.e.x into a sharper gait than either of you wish to go, because mounted on a fretting horse, who cannot be brought down to a comfortable rate of speed until all but tired out.

In the hunting-field you expect to go fast for a short time, and it is alone the speed and the occasional obstacle which lend the zest to the sport. But for the ride on the road, which to many of us is a lazy luxury, you need variety in speed as well as gaits for both comfort and pleasure. Patroclus here will walk, amble, rack, single-foot, trot, canter, gallop, and run, or go from any one into any other at will; and every one of these gaits is unmistakably distinct, crisp, and well performed. Nor have I ever found him any the less accomplished cross-country, within his limitation of condition and speed, for having had a complete education for the road. When I give him his head and loosen my curb, I find him just as free as if I had never restrained him from choosing his own course. Who can deny that the pleasure to be derived from such a horse for daily use does not exceed that to be got from one who can only trot on the road, or run and jump in the field?

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE XIV.

LANDING.]

Perhaps Nelly will never learn so much, for Patroclus is an exceptionally intelligent and well-suppled horse. But she can learn a good deal of it. Patroclus had no idea of any gait but a walk or trot when I bought him, nor did he start with any better equipment than Penelope; and in less than a year he knew all that he knows now, and much that he has forgotten. For in the many High School airs which he once could at call perform, he is altogether rusty from sheer lack of usage. But the "moral" may remain, though the fable may have long since pa.s.sed from the memory.

XLVII.

Some horses, who trot squarely, will go naturally from a walk into a little amble or pace, which is sometimes called a "shuffle." Often this is an agreeable and handsome gait, but not infrequently far from pleasant. Often, too, it will spoil the speed of the walk, as the horse will insensibly fall into it if pushed beyond his ease. A slower rate at a faster pace is always easier to a horse than the extreme of speed at the lesser gait. It is scarcely worth while in the East to try to teach a horse to amble or rack if he does not naturally do so, though it can often be done.

Apart from the agreeable and useful side of the true rack as a gait, it has not a few further advantages. In coming from a canter to a walk, a horse may be taught to slow up into a rack, and then drop to the walk, or to stop in the same manner. This enables him to come down without the least suspicion of that roughness which almost all horses show when stopping a canter, particularly if done quickly; unless, indeed, they be "poised" before being stopped, as a School-ridden horse always is from every gait. Moreover, when you rein a cantering horse down within the slowest limit of his speed at that pace, as to allow a team to pa.s.s, or for a similar purpose, if he knows how, he will fall into a rack, from which he can with much more comfort to himself and you resume the canter, than if he had fallen into a walk.

A rack is not an interruption of the canter, as is a jog or walk, but a mere _r.e.t.a.r.dando_, as it were. Still a rapid walk, a trot which varies from six to ten miles, and a well-collected canter suffice for any of our Eastern needs. These, and the gallop, moreover, are considered the only permissible paces by the School-riders of Europe.

In our Southern States rackers are bred for, and the instinct is confirmed by training. In many warm countries, ambling is bred for. I do not think that any horse with practically but a single gait, as is usually the case with the ambler or racker, comes up to the requisite standard of usefulness. Of the two, I should give my preference, in our lat.i.tude, to a mere trotter, if easy, who had a busy walk beside.

But in addition to the trot and canter, any comfortable gait may often be a relief, and it is eminently desirable, if the horse can learn it without spoiling his proper paces. Such a gait adds vastly to a horse's value for the saddle.

I cannot agree with the School-riders that a rack may not be a good School gait. Patroclus' rack, when collected, is certainly as clean a performance as any of his other gaits. From it he will drop back to a walk, or fall into a canter or gallop with either lead, or into a square trot. And this more quickly than from another gait, for if, in a canter, the indication to trot be given him out of season, he may be obliged to complete one more stride before he can execute the order; whereas, from a rack, which is always a mid-stride for any gait, he can instantly fall into the one commanded. The indication and execution are often all but instantaneous from the rack. He is really more neatly collected on the rack proper than on any other gait, except the canter; and though the rack is unrecognized as a School pace, I feel certain that I could convince any master of the Haute Ecole that within proper limits it is an addition, not a loss, to the education of a horse. What School-riders mean when they exclude the rack from School-paces is that a racker has rarely any other gait; and in the usual loose-jointed rack of the South a horse is certainly not well enough poised for use in School performances.

XLVIII.

To come back to our original text, then, it is quite impossible to say, as a whole, what seat is intrinsically the best, or what nation furnishes the best of riders. It appears to me that there is such a thing as a _natural_ seat. Such a seat is clearly shown on the frieze of the Parthenon, and in a less artistic way may be seen among any hors.e.m.e.n riding without stirrups. Although Xenophon has been misunderstood in this particular, I feel convinced that his description calls for what I understand to be the natural seat. And the best military riders make the nearest approach to this position.

By military seat I by no means intend to convey the idea of a straight leg, forked radish style. That is not the military seat proper. It is only in spite of such a seat, or in spite of the short stirrup of the East, and because they are always in the saddle, that the Mexican gaucho and the Arab of the desert both ride as magnificently as they do. The best military rider should, and does, carry the leg as it naturally falls when sitting on his breech, not his crotch, on the bare back of a horse. The steeple-chaser, or cross-country rider, for perfectly satisfactory reasons, has a much shorter stirrup. But on the road, he should, and generally does, come back more nearly to the natural length. The main advantage in the very long stirrup which obtains among so many peoples lies in the possibility of sitting close on a trot with greater ease, and of using the la.s.so or whip, or in having a free hand for their sundry sports or duties. And a high pommel and cantle are advantageous in helping the rider preserve his seat when he might be dragged--not thrown--from it in some of his peculiar experiences. But the perfectly straight leg always bears a suggestion of the parting advice of the groom to a Sunday rider just leaving the stable: "Look straight between his hears, sir, and keep your balance, and you _can't_ come hoff." On the other hand, the advantages of an extremely short stirrup, such as prevails in the Orient, are very difficult to be understood at all.

The military riders of every civilized country, where enlistments are long enough, and where proper care is given to the instruction in equestrianism, are excellent. It would be curious indeed if men who devote their lives to the art should not be so. Some of our old army cavalry officers rode gloriously. Our volunteer cavalry, late in the war, rode strongly, though not always handsomely. During the past twenty years the severe work and long marches of our regular mounted troops have militated greatly against equestrianism as an art. Some of the most accomplished riders I have ever known have been in the United States Army. Philip Kearny, that _preux chevalier_, the "one-armed devil," was in every sense a superb rider. I have seen him with his cap in one hand, his empty sleeve blowing outward with his speed, and his sword dangling from his wrist, ride over a Virginia snake fence such as most of us would want to knock at least the top rail off.

"How he strode his brown steed! How we saw his blade brighten In the one hand still left,--and the reins in his teeth!

He laughed like a boy when the holidays heighten, But a soldier's glance shot from his visor beneath!"

And a man who could not follow him did not long remain upon his staff.

One of my lost opportunities occurred for such a reason during Pope's campaign, when General Kearny, who had dispatched right and left all his aides, beckoned to me at dusk one evening to ride out and draw the fire of some of the enemy's troops supposed to be on the edge of a wood, some half a mile or so distant. My own horse had been shot, and my equipments lost. I had captured an old farm-horse without a saddle, and had extemporized a rope bridle. The course lay athwart some open fields, with a number of fences still standing. My desire to do this work stood in inverse ratio to my steed's ability to second me. And no sooner had I ridden up and touched my cap for orders, than the general had gauged the poverty of my beast and rig, and speedily selected a better mounted messenger.

During the war, among the volunteer troops, we used in some of the divisions to organize steeple-chases during a long term of inactive operations, and good ones we frequently had; the old style steeple-chase over an unknown course being the fashion, and the steeple generally a prominent tree, at a distance of a couple of miles. Often the course was round a less distant tree and back again.

Not a few good riders and horses were forthcoming to enter for such an event, and I have rarely seen better riding than there. An unknown course over Virginia fences, and through patches of Virginia second growth, especially after heavy rains, when mere gutters became rivers for a number of hours, and the ground was much like hasty-pudding, could be a test to try the best of horses and hors.e.m.e.n.

These are but isolated examples, instanced only as showing that every species of hard saddle work is very naturally apt to be cultivated among men whose duty keeps them in the saddle the better part of every day. And it is well known that English army officers are among the very best cross-country riders, and not a few have occupied the dignity of M. F. H., and done it credit. Surely such a rider, trained in the niceties of the _manege_, as well as experienced in riding to hounds, may fitly be placed at the head of the equestrian roll of honor.

After excluding professionals, then (and exceptional individuals), I am afraid I must brave criticism in calling the officers of civilized mounted troops distinctly the best cla.s.s of riders. Next--perhaps you will say in the same category--comes that cla.s.s in England which makes its one pleasure the prosecution of the most splendid of all sports, fox-hunting, and has reached perfection in the art. Excluding all riders who do not belong to the cla.s.ses available for our imitation, there comes next, _longo intervallo_, the civilian rider everywhere.

It is impossible to draw any comparison between the above cla.s.ses and even our own cowboys, whose peculiar duties and untamed mustangs prescribe their long leathers and horned pommel. Nor can the equatorial style be fairly contrasted with what meets the wants of the denizens of the civilized cities of the temperate zone.

In this country, the Southerner is the most constantly in the saddle, and a good rider in the sunny South is a thoroughly good rider. But I have often wondered at the number of poor ones it is possible to find in localities where everybody moves about in the saddle. Many men there, who ride all the time, seem to have acquired the trick of breaking every commandment in the decalogue of equitation. Using horses as a mere means of transportation seems sometimes to reduce the steed to a simple beast of burden, and equestrianism to the bald ability to sit in the saddle as you would in an ox-cart.

I think I have seen more graceful equestriennes in the South than anywhere else,--than even in England. But I must admit that all women who ride well possess such attractions for me as perhaps to warp my judgment in endeavoring to draw comparisons. Who but a Paris could have awarded the apple?

Although the Southern woman refuses to ride the trot, she has a proper subst.i.tute for it, and her seat is generally admirable. Though I greatly admire a square trot well ridden in a side-saddle, it is really the rise on this gait which makes so many crooked female riders among ourselves and our British cousins. This ought not to be so, but ladies are apt to resent too much severity in instruction, and without strict obedience to her master, a lady never learns to ride gracefully and stoutly. In the South, ladies ride habitually, and moreover a rack, single-foot, and canter are not only graceful, but straight-sitting paces for a woman.

It is not to-day risking much, however, to prophesy that within the lapse of little time our Eastern cities will boast as many clever Amazons as are to be found in the South. Who can contend that our Yankee women have not the intelligence, courage, vigor, and grace to rank with the riders of any clime?

XLIX.

And now, Master Tom, let me again impress upon you that I have been giving you only the most rudimentary idea of how to train your mare.

By no means expect that Nelly will ever execute the traverse, pirouette, Spanish trot, or piaffer, let alone trot or gallop backwards, as these airs should be performed, by any such superficial education. But you will certainly find her more agreeable, more tractable, safer, and easier, and you will have both enjoyed the schooling. And I feel a.s.sured that having gone so far you will not stop short of the next step, the study and practice of the art in its true refinements. I may, moreover, safely a.s.sume that after you have once owned a School-trained horse, you will never again be content with what might be appropriately termed the "perfect saddle horse" of commerce.