“Forward, Miss Esmeralda, forward!” cries the other teacher.

“That is because Miss Lady did not go into the corner, and so is too far in advance,” your teacher explains.  “You must, in class, keep your distance as carefully when the rifer immediately before you is wrong as when she is right.  It is the necessity of doing that, of having to be ready for emergencies, to think of others as much as of your horse and of yourself, that give class teaching much of its value.”

“Forward, ladies, forward,” cries the other teacher.  “Remember that you are not to go to sleep!  Now prepare to trot, and don’t go too fast at first.  Remember always to change from one gait to another gently, for your own sake, that you may not be thrown out of position; for your horse’s, that he may not be startled, and made unruly and ungraceful.  He has nerves as well as you.  Now, prepare to trot!  Trot!  Shorten your reins, Miss Beauty!  Shorten them!” and during the next minute or two, while the class trots about a third of a mile, the poor beauty hears every command in the manual addressed to her, and smilingly tries, but tries in vain to obey them; but in an unhappy moment the teacher’s glance falls on the society young lady and he bids her keep her right shoulder back.  “You told me that before,” she says, rather more crisply than is prescribed by any of he manuals of etiquette which constitute her sole library.

“Then why don’t you do it?” is his answer.  “Keep your left shoulder forward,” he says a moment later, whereupon the society young lady turns to the right, and plants herself in the centre of the ring with as much dignity as is possible, considering that her horse, not having been properly stopped, and feeling the nervous movements of her hands, moves now one leg and now another, now draws his head down pulling her forward on the pommel, and generally disturbs the beautiful repose of manner upon which she prides herself.

“You are tired?  No?  Frightened?  Your stirrup is too short?  You are not comfortable?” demands the teacher, riding up beside her.  “Is there anything which you would like to have me do?”

“I don’t like to be told to do two things at once,” she responds in a tone which should be felt by the thermometer at the other end of the ring.

“But you must do two things at once, and many more than two, on horseback,” he says; “when you are rested, take your place in the line.”

“I think I will dismount,” she says.

“Very well,” and before she has time to change her mind, a bell is rung, a groom guides her horse to the mounting-stand, the master himself takes her out of the saddle, courteously bids her be seated in the reception room and watch the others, and she finds her little demonstration completely and effectually crushed, and, what is worse, apparently without intention.  Nobody appears to be aware that she has intended a rebellion, although “whole Fourth of Julys seem to bile in her veins.”