“I say, Anthony—can you ride?”
“No more than yourself, but I suppose we shall contrive to stick on somehow.”
“Would it not be as well to have a trial?” said I, with considerable intrepidity. “Suppose we go together to the riding-school, and have an hour or two’s practice.”
“I have no earthly manner of objection,” said Anthony. “I presume there’s lots of sawdust there and the exhibition will, at any rate, be a private one. Allons!” and we departed for the amphitheatre.
We inquired for a couple of peaceable hacks, which were forthwith furnished us. I climbed up with some difficulty into the saddle, and having submitted to certain partial dislocations of the knee and ankle, at the hands of the master of the ring (rather a ferocious Widdicomb, by the way), and having also been instructed in the art of holding the reins, I was pronounced fit to start. Anthony, whose legs were of a parenthetical build, seemed to adapt himself more easily to his seat.
“Now then, trot!” cried the sergeant, and away we went with a wild expenditure of elbow.
“Toes in, toes in, gentlemen!” bellowed our instructor; “blowed but you’d drive them wild if you had spurs on! You ain’t been at the dancing-school lately, have you? Steady—steady—very good. Down your elbows, gentlemen, if you please! them bridles isn’t pumps. Heads up! now gallop! Bravo! very good. Screw in the knees a little. Hold on—hold on, sir, or damme you’ll be off!”
And sure enough I was within an ace of canting over, having lost a stirrup, when the sergeant caught hold of me by the arm.
“I’ll tell you what, gents,” he said, “you’ll never learn to ride in this ’varsal world, unless you tries it without the irons. Nothing like that for giving a man a sure seat So, Bill, take off the stirrups, will you! Don’t be afeard, gentlemen. I’ll make riders of you yet, or my name isn’t Kickshaw.”
Notwithstanding the comforting assurances of Kickshaw, I felt considerably nervous. If I could not maintain my seat with the assistance of the stirrups, what the mischief was I to do without them? I looked rebelliously at Anthony’s stirrup, but that intrepid individual seemed to have nerved himself to meet any possible danger. His enormous legs seemed calculated by nature to embrace the body of his charger, and he sat erect like an overgrown Bacchus bestriding a kilderkin of beer.