Oneself in Paris
by learning to make a war-horse caracole, but there was no use in taking
such things too seriously; that in war "a ruder way of riding was more
in use, without observing the precise rules of riding the great
horse."[263] He could not feel that artistic passion for form in
horsemanship which breathes from the pages of Pluvinel's book Le
Maneige Royal[264] in which magnificent engravings show Louis XIII.
making courbettes, voltes, and "caprioles" around the Louvre, while a
circle of grandees gravely discuss the deportment of his charger. Even
Sir Philip Sidney made gentle fun of the hippocentric universe of his
Italian riding master:
"When the right vertuous Edward Wotton, and I, were at the Emperors
Court together, wee gave ourselves to learne horsemanship of John Pietro
Pugliano: one that with great commendation had the place of an esquire
in his stable. And hee, according to the fertilnes of the Italian wit,
did not onely afoord us the demonstration of his practise, but sought to
enrich our mindes with the contemplations therein, which hee thought
most precious. But with none I remember mine eares were at any time more
loden, then when (ether angred with slowe paiment, or mooved with our
learner-like admiration,) he exercised his speech in the prayse of his
facultie. Hee sayd, Souldiers were the noblest estate of mankinde, and
horsemen, the noblest of Souldiours. He sayde, they were the Maistres of
warre, and ornaments of peace: speedy goers, and strong abiders,
triumphers both in Camps and Courts. Nay, to so unbeleeved a poynt hee
proceeded, as that no earthly thing bred such wonder to a Prince, as to
be a good horseman. Skill of government, was but a Pedanteria in
comparison: then woulde he adde certaine prayses, by telling what a
peerlesse beast a horse was. The only serviceable Courtier without
flattery, the beast of the most beutie, faithfulness, courage, and such
more, that if I had not beene a peece of a Logician before I came to
him, I think he would have perswaded mee to have wished my selfe a
Horse."[265]
That this was somewhat the spirit of the French academies there seems no
doubt. Though they claimed to give an equal amount of physical and
mental exercise, they tended to the muscular side of the programme.
Pluvinel, says Tallemant des Reaux, "was hardly more intelligent than
his horses,"[266] and the academies are supposed to have declined after
his death.[267] "All that is to be learned in these Academies," says
Clarendon, "is Riding, Dancing, and Fencing, besides some Wickednesses
they do not profess to teach. It is true they have men there who teach
Arithmetick, which they call Philosophy, and the Art of Fortification,
which they call the Mathematicks; but what Learning they had there, I
might easily imagine, when he assured me, that in Three years which he
had spent in the Academy, he never saw a Latin book nor any Master that
taught anything there, who would not have taken it very ill to be
suspected to speake or understand Latin."[268] This sort of aspersion
was continued by Dr Wallis, the Savilian Professor of Mathematics at
Oxford in 1700, who was roused to a fine pitch of indignation by
Maidwell's efforts to start an academy in London:[269]
"Of teachers in the academie, scarce any of a higher character than a
valet-de-chambre. And, if such an one, who (for instance) hath waited on
his master in one or two campagnes, and is able perhaps to copy the
draught of a fortification from another paper; this is called
mathematicks; and, beyond this (if so much) you are not to expect."
A certain Mr P. Chester finishes the English condemnation of a school,
such as Benjamin's, by declaring that its pretensions to fit men for
life was "like the shearing of Hoggs, much Noyse and little Wooll,
nothing considerable taught that I know, butt only to fitt a man to be a
French chevalier, that is in plain English a Trooper."[270]
These comments are what one expects from Oxford, to be sure, but even M.
Jusserand acknowledges that the academies were not centres of
intellectual light, and quotes to prove it certain questions asked of a
pupil put into the Bastille, at the demand of his father:
"Was it not true that the Sieur Varin, his father, seeing that he had no
inclination to study, had put him into the Academie Royale to there
learn all sorts of exercises, and had there supported him with much
expense?
"He admitted that his father, while his mother was living, had put him
into the Academie Royale and had given him for that the necessary means,
and paid the ordinary pension, 1600 livres a year.
"Was it not true that after having been some time at the Academie
Royale, he was expelled, having disguised girls in boys' clothes to
bring them there?
"He denied it. He had never introduced into the school any academiste
feminine: he had departed at the summons of his father, having taken
proper leave of M. and Mme. de Poix."[271]
However, something of an education had to be provided for Royalist boys
at the time of the Civil War, when Oxford was demoralized. Parents
wandering homeless on the Continent were glad enough of the academies.
Even the Stuarts tried them, though the Duke of Gloucester had to be
weaned from the company of some young French gallants, "who, being
educated in the same academy, were more familiar with him than was
thought convenient."[272] It was a choice between academies or such an
education as Edmund Verney endured in a dull provincial city as the sole
pupil of an exiled Regius Professor of Greek at Cambridge.
