Mower County transcript. [volume] (Lansing, Minn.) 1868-1915, 1889-06-12
CAVALRY RIDING DRILL

CAVALRY RIDING DRILL
An Ex-Trooper Tells How Raw Recruits
Are Put Through Their PAGES.
The first riding lesson usually takes
place In the "riding-school," where, as
the floor is covered with ''tan," 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
Il. e., the walls Of the schooD, and the
recruit is taught to "stand at ease"
and to step from side to side of his
horses 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
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 horsehesh is
very perverse in rubbing it's side
against the school wall with a recruits
leg for a buffer. The day when l got
my first riding lesson many of us
started off by pulling on our horses
mouths, and got Ito quote our rough
rider) "tll over the shop like pack of
| sheep" After a few turns round
during which the trough" taught US
the aids to horsemanship in the pre-
liminary stages of the "wallx" I'VE
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 1--WE 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 tritling job. When it came
to fixing our legs, getting them we'll
back, raising our toes and sinking our
heels, we got more 10 do than we ever
bargained for. Your teacher is a 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 q examining is Il
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 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 rough-riding 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 rough" called
us to a 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
''rough' again let us know bit of his
mind about our first appearance as
cavalrymen. He never saw such
blooming lot of asses in AL 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 EARNS" 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
moro of cavalry equitation, he had
better join. A few months drill will
teach him all he will care to learn. 49,
London St. James Gazette.
Tho Tine