Sidesaddle by Bonnie Bryant Page A

domesticating horses, they found that some were better at certain kinds of tasks than others,” Tiffani said. “That was when they began breeding horses to improve the skills that were important to them, and before too long they had helped nature create separate breeds. Some breeds are known for their strength, some for their speed, some for their gentle personalities, and some for endurance.These are skills developed in nature but refined by humans. In the next few minutes, we will examine just a few of the breeds that can be found all around the world today. Carole?”
    “Thank you, Tiffani,” Carole said. She turned over the first chart.
    Carole and Tiffani had broken down the breeds into geographical lines and then into groups. They’d done an enormous amount of work, showing the important bloodlines in each of the breeds. Tiffani spent a particularly long time explaining about the Tennessee walker, but Carole also had an opportunity to talk about Thoroughbreds—Starlight was half Thoroughbred.
    Stevie and a lot of the other Horse Wise members actually knew much of what Carole and Tiffani were saying. Everybody knew that Friesians—the big black workhorses of Europe—were used to pull hearses. A lot of it was totally new, certainly to Stevie, who’d never heard of some of the Asian breeds that Carole talked about. Stevie knew that Carole had started out knowing a lot, but it was amazing to think what she must have had to study to learn all that she’d put into the report.
    Nobody talked or interrupted throughout the whole presentation because it was so interesting and informative. Max sat at his desk, clearly as interested in what his students were saying as everybody else was.
    When they were done, the whole room exploded inapplause. Stevie clapped, and so did Lisa, but Phil was doing more than that. He was practically whooping, obviously very glad that he’d come to Horse Wise instead of Cross County that morning. Stevie looked at him out of the corner of her eye, clapping away. Then she looked at Carole and Tiffani, both pleased with the response their audience was giving them and bowing occasionally.
    Stevie leaned over to Phil and whispered, “I think Carole did most of the work on this. She knows almost all this stuff off the top of her head, you know?”
    Phil looked at Stevie quizzically, but he didn’t say anything. He just kept on clapping.
    Max then announced the end of Horse Wise, but he told everybody to stay where they were.
    “I know a lot of you have been working on your Learn Something New reports. If any of them begin to measure up to the great report we’ve just had from Carole and Tiffani, then we’re all going to be learning a lot of new things today. I thought it would be best if we got our sandwiches and began right here in my office so that those of you who want to make presentations can. Then we’ll go tack up and see what the rest of you have learned.”
    Everybody had something to contribute. Lisa was one of the first, giving her report on military riding and its influence on modern riding styles. April had decided tolearn about different kinds of tack. She had made charts of English and Western tack and also worldwide variations—like the differences between American and Argentinean cowboy tack, as well as Arabian saddles and bridles.
    Adam Levine had prepared a report on horse communication, complete with recordings of different neighing and whinnying sounds, as well as photographs showing variations of body language.
    Meg Durham presented a report on braiding styles. Joe gave his report on the Bureau of Land Management. Betsy Cavanaugh read a whole paper on Olympic competitors. Olivia presented a book report on
Black Beauty.
    When the last presenter was done, the meeting finally broke up and moved to the schooling ring for the riding demonstrations.
    There were all sorts of demonstrations. One rider showed how she’d learned to polish her pony’s hooves. Another