For rich people there is no cleaner or healthier form of pleasure, no better training in nerve and all that makes a man.
Leadership
The training for leadership among the Germans is a matter of beer and fencing, among the Americans of office work, among the British of field sports. Which method is best to save leaders of men from corruption, and decadence? The mettle of our pastures gives cool judgment in administration, leadership in affairs, and in times of peril a sterling worth of manhood proof against disaster.
Far be it from me then to deride the British horsemanship. Any horseman who can tolerate so slippery and unreliable a contraption as the English saddle is greatly to be envied and admired.
Always a timid horseman but emulous, I made two attempts to ride the damned thing, and came to grief without the least delay. The third try was quite a success, the occasion being a cavalry charge into a converging fire at point-blank range. I was much too scared to fall off, and so came to the conclusion that any fool could ride anything if his attention were sufficiently distracted by a hail of bullets. After that I went to the best horseman I could find in England and asked him to explain the merits of his saddle. "The English saddle," said Lord Lonsdale, "is made for falling off. You see it throws the rider clear of a falling horse."
The pleasure saddle
This really explained the English saddle in terms of sport, which any fellow ought to understand. So I tried the saddle again, and found that one could ride straight leg at any gait quite easily by merely dispensing with the stirrups. It was almost as good as bareback. But with the leathers shortened, riding bent-leg, one could actually use the stirrups. Since then I have put my stock saddles away, and taken recruit lessons in the riding school. A little powdered resin on the leather straps of one's breeches makes them look quite smart and deceives the Instructor in Equitation. Still, I am a novice, trying in vain to rise at the trot with that poke forward of the head which so beautifully imitates the movement of a hen as she enquires for worms.
It is only by practical testing that I learned the qualities of the English saddle, and so brought it into comparison with that of the stock range. It is not easy to free one's mind from bias, to realise that perfectly sane men have reasonable methods other than one's own, and that the mere fact that one's critic is an obnoxious bounder does not dispose of all his arguments. I venture to claim that the range horseman has intelligence equal to that which guides British horsemanship, and added to that the deeper intimacy of one who allows no hired hand to touch his horses, who cares for them as a hireling never can, and whose life depends upon his competence. It is from the range point of view that I venture now into the field of criticism.
To teach a novice to ride with the stock saddle I lead him on to talk about his girl. By the time he forgets that he is exaggerating on horseback he rides quite decently.
To teach a novice to ride with the English saddle is a matter of long and severe training. In the end he rides in spite of a saddle, which is by no means an aid to horsemanship.