184 USES OF THE SCHOOL 



he can do many wonderful, many beautiful, many useful 

 things, not to speak of what he has done for horsemanship 

 in the past. Some of the so-called "airs" of the high- 

 school are truly wonderful such as the croupade or the 

 capriole, or galloping backwards ; some, such as the piaffer, 

 or the Spanish march and trot, are of singular grace ; and 

 the fact that by a school -training a dangerous horse may 

 be made safe, or a chronic stumbler be taught to catch 

 himself always, or the average ungainly, clumsily-moving 

 brute be made light and handy, and responsive to the bit 

 and legs, demonstrates its usefulness. Is it not useful to 

 take a puller, or a horse so high-strung that it is a risk for 

 any one to ride him, and make him moderate and safe for 

 even a woman to ride, if she is taught what his training 

 is, and is trained herself ? Have you ever watched horses 

 let loose in a pretty paddock after a long confinement in 

 the stable, and paid heed to their free step and splendid 

 bearing? Well, everything they do of their own accord 

 they can be made to do at the bidding of man by a high- 

 school training. All this, you think, has no value except 

 from an artistic stand -point; but neither, it might be 

 claimed, has hunting except as an exercise in other 

 words, it is art versus exercise. Neither statement is an 

 argument; and a moderate use of high -school methods 

 has a distinct value which we will discuss when we come 

 to talk of road-riding as a separate matter. 



The high-school has been of inestimable use in the past ; 

 to-day, when w^e think of nothing but athletics, its uses 

 are not so apparent to the athletic rider. Although it 

 can be theoretically demonstrated that a school -rider on 

 a school -horse ought to do anything and everything bet- 

 ter than any one else, the truth is that he does not. Given 

 the perfect rider and the perfect horse, and he would, no 

 doubt, do so ; but no horse or rider ever is perfect. It is 



