and you would confide in some other exercise rider, if possible, in the hearing of seven or eight pupils, that your master was not much of a rider after all, that the “natural rider is best,” and you would insinuate that to observe perfection it was only necessary to look at you.  If, in addition to this, you could intimate to any worried or impatient pupils that they had not been properly taught, you would make yourself generally beloved, and these are the ways of the casual exercise rider, male and female.  But you, Esmeralda, are slightly unfitted for the perfect assumption of this part by knowing how certain things ought to be done, although you cannot do them, and alas! you are not yet adapted to the humbler but prettier character of the real exercise rider, who is thoroughly taught, and whose every movement is a pleasure to behold.

There are many such women and a few men who prefer the ring to the road for various reasons, and from them you may learn much, both by observation and from the hints which many of them will give you if they find that you are anxious to learn, and that you are really nothing more pretentious than a solitary student.  So into the saddle you go, and you and Nell begin to walk about in company.  “In company,” indeed, for about half a round, and then you begin to fall behind.  Touching your Abdallah lightly with whip and heel starts him into a trot and coming up beside Nell you start off her Arab, and both horses are rather astonished to be checked.  What do these girls want, they think, and when you fall behind again, it takes too strokes of the whip to urge Abdallah forward, Arab is unmoved by your passing him, and you find the breadth of the ring dividing you and Nell.  You pause, she turns to the right, crosses the space between you, turns again and is by your side, and now both of you begin to see what you must do.  Nell, who is riding on the inside, that is to say on the included square, must check her horse very slightly after turning each corner, and you must hasten yours a little before turning, and a little after, so as to give her sufficient space to turn, and, at the same time, to keep up with her.  You, being on her left, must be very careful every moment to have a firm hold of your left rein, so as to keep away from her feet, and she must keep especial watch of her right rein in order to guard herself.

After each of you has learned her part pretty well, you should exchange places and try again, and then have a round or two of trotting, keeping your horses’ heads in line.  You will find both of them very tractable to this discipline, because accustomed to having your master’s horse keep pace with them, and because they often go in pairs at the music rides, and you must not expect that an ordinary livery stable horse would be as easily managed.  It is rather fashionable to sneer at the riding-school horse as too mild for the use of a good rider, and very likely, while you and Nell are patiently trying your little experiment, you will hear a youth with very evident straps on his trousers, superciliously requesting to have “something spirited” brought in from the stable for him.