A German or French woman possibly may hold her own with an Englishwoman in a ball room or a box at the opera; but put her on horseback, and take her to the covert side, she is "not in it" with her English rivals.
Although the advantages and opportunities I speak of, however, render words of advice upon female equitation unnecessary to ladies of the sangre azul, I trust they may be found useful to others who may not have had such opportunities.
In the upper middle classes nothing is more probable than the marriage of one of the daughters of the house with a man whose future lot may be cast in the colonies, where if a woman cannot ride she will be sorely at a loss. Unlike the ladies of high degree above alluded to, the daughter of a man in good position in the middle class will often not have opportunities of learning to ride until she is fifteen or sixteen, and by this time the youthful frame, supple as it may appear, has acquired (so to speak) "a set," which at first renders riding far from agreeable; because it calls into action whole sets of muscles and ligaments heretofore rarely brought into play, or rather only partially so. Hence the unpleasant stiffness that always follows the first essays of the tyro in riding of the age I speak of, and which painful feeling too often so discourages beginners that they give up the thing in disgust.
Now this unpleasant consequence of the first lessons may be easily obviated by the following means. Bearing in mind that pain or stiffness is the result of want of supplesse, the first desideratum is to acquire this most desirable elasticity. To accomplish this, three months before the pupil is put on horseback she should begin a course of training in suppling and extension motions on foot, precisely similar to those drilled into a cavalry recruit in the army. No amount of dancing will do what is required. Even the professional danseuse, with her constant exercise of the ronde de jambe, never possesses that mobile action of the waist and play of the joints of the upper part of the figure so thoroughly to be acquired by the exercises I speak of, which also have the further greater advantage of giving development and expansion to the chest. I therefore respectfully advise every careful mother, who is desirous of seeing her daughters become accomplished horsewomen, before taking them to the riding master (of whom more hereafter), in the first place to employ a good drill master.
Possibly, the young ladies may have had drill instruction at school; but experience tells me that such instruction is too often slurred over, or only practised at such long intervals that its effect is confined to causing the pupil to walk upright and carry herself well—a very desirable matter, but not all that is requisite as a preparation for riding.
Drill, to be effective for the above purposes, should be practised daily. The course of instruction should begin with very short lessons, lasting not more than twenty minutes at first; but these, given in the presence of mamma, should be most rigidly and minutely carried out, otherwise they are useless. They should gradually be increased in length, according to the strength of the pupil, until she can stand an hour's drilling without fatigue. The course should include instruction in the use of dumb-bells, very carefully given. The weight of these should in no case exceed seven pounds for a young lady of fifteen or sixteen, and may judiciously be confined to three and four pounds for those of a more tender age. The great use of dumb-bells is to give flexibility to the shoulder joints and expansion to the chest. The first lessons should not last more than five minutes, and in no case be continued an instant after the pupil exhibits the slightest symptom (easily discernable) of fatigue.
Of the course of drill instruction, the lessons called the "extension motions" are the most effectual in promoting flexibility of the whole figure; but they must be gone into by very gradual and careful induction, and their effect will then be not only beneficial, but pleasant to the pupil.
As it is possible that this may meet the eye of some lady who resides where no eligible drill master is available, I propose in my next chapter to give a programme of the exercises I speak of, which may then be practised under the superintendence of the lady herself or her governess. But in all cases where the services of a competent and thoroughly practised drill master are to be had it is always best to employ them.
Simple as the instruction may appear, the art of imparting it has to be acquired in a school where the most minute attention is paid to every detail, where nothing is allowed to be done in a careless or slovenly manner, and where (so to speak) the pupil is never asked to read before he can spell. It is this jumping in medias with beginners in riding that so often causes mischief and disgusts the pupil, who begins by thinking that it is the easiest thing in the world to ride well, but when she is put on horseback finds to her dismay that it is anything but easy until acquired by practice and thoroughly good instructions.