“Not one of your school horses, taught to tramp a treadmill round, but a regular flyer,” he explains.

“Is he a very good rider?” you ask your master.  “Last time he was hear I had to take him off Abdallah,” he says sadly, and then he goes to the mounting-stand to deny “the regular flyer,” and to tender instead, “an animal that we don’t give to everybody, William.”  Enter “William,” otherwise Billy Buttons, whom the gentleman covetous of a flyer soon finds to be enough for him to manage, because William, although accustomed to riders awkward through weakness, is not used to the manners of what is called the “three-legged trotter”; that is to say, the man whose unbent arms and tightened reins make a straight line from his shoulders to his horse’s mouth, while his whole weight is thrown upon the reins by a backward inclination of his body.

If you would like to know how Billy feels about it, Esmeralda, bend your chin toward your throat, and imagine a bar of iron placed across your tongue and pulling your head upward.  It would hurt you, but you could raise your head and still go forward, making wild gestures with your hands, kicking, perhaps, in a ladylike manner, as Gail Hamilton kicked Halicarnassus, but by no means stopping.  Now suppose that bar of iron drawn backward by reins passing one on each side of your shoulders and held firmly between your scapulae; you could not go forward without almost breaking your neck, could you?  No more could Billy, if his rider would let out his reins, bend his elbows, and hold his hands low, almost touching his saddle, but, as it is, he goes on, and if he should rear by and by, and if his rider should slide off, be not alarmed.  The three-legged trotter is not the kind of horseman to cling to his reins, and he will not be dragged, and Billy is too good-tempered not to stop the moment he has rid himself of his tormentor.  But while he is still on Billy’s back, and flattering himself that he is doing wonders in subjugating the “horse that we don’t give to everybody,” do you and Nell go to the centre of the ring and see if you can stop properly.  Pretty well done, but wait a moment before trying it again, for it is not pleasant to a horse.  Sit still a few minutes, and then try and see if you can back your horse a step or two.

In order to do this, it is not enough to sit up straight and to say “back,” or even to say “bake,” which, according to certain “natural riders,” is the secret of having the movement executed properly.  You must draw yourself up and lean backward, touching your horse both with your foot and with your whip, in order that he may stand squarely, and you must raise your wrists a little, and the same time turning them inward.  The horse will take a step, you must instantly sit up straight, lower your hands, and then repeat the movement until he has backed far enough.  Four steps will be quite as many as you should try when working thus by yourself, because you do not wish to form any bad habits, and your master will probably find much to criticise in your way of executing the movement.  The most that you can do for yourself is to be sure that Abdallah makes but one step for each of your demands.  If he make two, lower your hands, and make him go forward, for a horse that backs unbidden is always troublesome and may sometimes be dangerous.