Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1889-06-06
CAVALRY RIDING DRILL

CAVALRY RIDING DRILL
An Ex-Trooper Tells How Raw Recruits
Arc Put Through Their PAGES.
The first riding lesson usually takes
place in the ''riding-school," where. as
the floor is covered with .stan," the
recruits who come off will fall softly.
The military authorities don't want
their recruits laid up in hospitals. The
lesson consists of leading the horse
around the riding school; so that the
axiom of learning to creep before walk
ing is slightly modified here, for the
recruit learns to walk his horse before
riding him. When he has led his
horse around for awhile, the horses
head is brought in from the boards
Ii. e., the walls of the schooD, and the
recruit is taught to s'stand at ease''
and to step from side to side of his
hors e's fore feet in measured PAGES.
Then comes the mount and usually
the unfortunate recruit has no sooner
got up on one side than he rolls over
on the other, owing to the vagaries OF
his horse, who knows that he has a
recruit in hand, and takes advantage
OF it. Presently the order is given to
march, and away file the horses
around the school walls, many of
the pupils thinking horsefesh is
very perverse in rubbing its side
against the school wall with recruit S
leg for buffer. The day when. I got
my first riding lesson many of us
started off by pulling on our horses
mouths, and got Ito quote our rough
rider) ''all over the shop like pack of
sheep" After few turns round
during which the ''rough'' taught us
the aids to horsem anship in the pre-
liminary stages of the ''walk"-we
learned that we were not to pull our
horses heads off, " but to handle the
reins gently by feeling them with our
wrists and not with our whole arms.
All we had to do Eve were told) was
to sit there and keep our bodies up
right with our chests forward, by hol-
lowing the back and drawing in our
stomachs, as well as to keep our
''chins off our stocks" and our heads
up. We began. to see that learning to
ride was no trifling job. When it came
to fixing our legs, getting them well
back, raising our toes and sinking our
heels, we got more to do than we ever
bargained for. Your teacher is hard
man to please; and I'm sure that by
sheer practice recruits at Canterbury
have got all their stomachs pressing
up against the diaphragms. Other
wise how do they muster such small
waists and such pigeOn-like chests?
The fact is that lungs, heart,
liver, stomach and spleen are all
packed together chestwards, like a tin
of Australian mutton. Whether nature
ever intended such a examining is a
question that the military authorities
don't study. Make your men as wooden
as possible-never mind nature, is
their dictum; and certainly they are
listened to. After we had done little
walking around the riding school we
got more confidence; and thought, no
doubt, that we should like a bit of a
''trot, - just to see what that was like.
When it did come to trotting many of
us fell off; or nearly fell off, and went
hobbling around the school-to quote
our bodybuilding again like lot of
stuffed dolls riding yer horses from
nose to Group" And certainly many
of us were more often on our horses
withers and launches than on the
center of their backs, and we had our
arms more often round their necks than
holding our reins. The trough" called
us to halt, and even here we were
at fault. Some Of us pulled too
much, or we pulled too little, or we
pulled awry, with the result that our
horses were ''all over the shop. -
At last we had stopped, our friend the
trough again let us know bit of his
mind about our first appearance as
cavalrymen. He never saw such a
blooming lot of asses in all his born
days; my old mother could ride better
than you," etc. He had probably told
the same yarn to generations of re-
cruits; but really we believed that we
were set of out-and-out buffers.
After few months riding drill the
cavalryman learns to ride his horse at
all PAGES; and when he can take him
through the turns, circles and wind
ings OF the menage drill, and knows
how to use his ''arms'' mounted, he is
fit to call himself real cavalry-man,
and is ready to go on and fight his
country's wars when he gets the
chance. If the reader wants to learn
more of cavalry equitation, he had
better join. A few months drill will
teach him all he will care to learn
London St. James Gazette.
THE ARBOR DIABOLL