There is a good deal taught in the best military schools

There is a good deal taught in the best military schools

There is a good deal taught in the best military schools, well worth time and study, which, with practice in horse-taming, would fill up the idle time of that numerous class who never read, and find time heavy on their hands, when out of town life.

But a military riding-school, says Colonel Greenwood, is too apt to teach you to sit on your horse as stiff as a statue, to let your right hand hang down as useless as if God had never gifted you with one, to stick your left hand out, with a stiff straight wrist like a boltsprit, and to turn your horse invariably on the wrong rein. I should not venture to say so much on my own authority, but Captain Nolan says further, speaking of the effect of the foreign school (not Baucher’s), on horses and men, The result of this long monotonous course of study is, that on the uninitiated the school rider makes a pleasing impression, his horse turns, prances, and caracoles without any visible aid, or without any motion in the horseman’s upright, imposing attitude. But I have lived and served with them. I have myself been a riding-master, and know, from experience, the disadvantages of this foreign seat and system.

Fonte: Tamming Horses