Start with the idea that good skating is a hard thing to acquire. It is. For the same reason it is interesting. Easy things never hold their interest very long. Graceful skating implies perseverance and determination. It requires close application to right principles from the very start and rigid concentration upon a number of important rules, several of which the skater will have to keep in mind during the moment of execution of any figures. But the fact that it is the chosen sport of most of the people dwelling in the northern parts of the world, women as well as men, proves that it is not too difficult to permanently hold the enthusiasm of lovers of outdoor sport.

Curves are the fundamental figures in skating. True, the racing skate and the hockey skate permit only straight strokes, but these skates are a development of the sport by which greater speed or steadier position against attack is obtained. Graceful skating and the execution of figures on the ice are impossible without the proper skate.

The first figures to learn, and the basis of all further progress in the art, are the outside edge circles. The outside edge of the skate is the edge furthest away from the body. There is an outside edge on each skate and this edge can be used to skate forward or backward; there are, therefore, four outside edge circles, one on right forward, one on left forward, one on right backward and one on left backward. For convenience and simplicity these edges are often designated thus: ROF, meaning right outside forward, etc.

The most important things to have in mind as one skates the elementary figure are carriage, poise and deliberation. If the body is correctly poised a slight stroke will carry the skater in the right direction; no amount of straining or kicking will cause the skate to execute the right figures if the body over that skate is in the wrong position or wrong balance.

My own skating as head of the ice ballet at the New York Hippodrome is fast and spectacular, I admit; it has to be so to be theatric, to catch the crowd, to startle the sensation seeker. But it is not quite so fast when I am skating for my own amusement.

Size is the next most important consideration in skating the elementary or school figures. All the plain circles should be made as large as possible without sacrificing correct balance all the way to the end of the curve. The European skaters make the plain circles, in the form of an eight, with a diameter of fifteen to twenty feet. The beginner will find about eight feet as large a circle as can be made without loss of poise, but this depends also upon the question of size and strength of the skater and whether man or woman.

It is essential that the skater learn to use both feet equally well. If one foot is harder than the other to manage, it must be skated with more often until equal skill is attained. It will generally be found that right handed persons are more proficient in skating with the left foot and vice versa. To skate each figure equally well on either foot is not merely the right standard to set; it will be found fundamental to the correct execution of figures implying a reverse direction, and it is the basis of success in pair skating.

Now we are ready to strike out on the right outside edge. Stand with feet together. Get your start on the right foot by pressing the left skate, by its edge, not by its point, firmly against the ice. Bend the skating knee a good deal, almost sink on it, something in the manner of the dancing dip, and lunge strongly forward, leaning toward the centre of the circle. The left leg should follow well behind, and a little across the print, with the knee bent and the toe turned out, and the body should be turned or twisted so that the right shoulder is almost directly over the right foot. This will bring the body flatly in line with the mark on the ice which the skate is making. This mark is called the print. (See the diagram for the first skating position near the feathers of the arrow.)

The arms will take their correct, natural position, the right arm being held well up and curved around the breast at a distance of about six inches and the left arm well extended directly behind the body.

This general position should be sustained during one-half of the circle. Then slowly bring the balance foot past the skating foot, turning the toe in and bending the knee of the balance foot as it is carried forward. It must be kept very close to the skating foot in passing, otherwise there will be a tendency for its weight to swing the skater out of the true circle he is making.

The fact that the balance leg, which was being carried behind the body, has now been brought in front of it, implies that a complete change in the balance of the body has taken place. Up to a little more than one-half of the circle the body has been held strongly forward; as the foot passes the skating leg the body assumes first a straight and then a slightly backward balance. The arms, too, have been serving to compensate the balance. At first they are held well toward the left or behind. As the body twists or turns into the new position and the shoulders are brought square with the direction of the print, the arms slowly swing forward and, from being held on the outside of the circle at the beginning of the stroke, are found on the inside of the circle at the end of the stroke.

The general principle of skating implies that the arms and the legs are used for compensating balances in almost every stroke. When the arms are on one side of the body the leg is on the other. There are a very few violations of this broad principle, but they are associated with the execution of extremely complicated figures.

The body performs a gradual and almost complete rotation during the execution of the forward outside circles. At the beginning of the stroke the back is toward the centre of the circle, at the end of the stroke one faces the centre. The twisting of the body during the stroke should be first at the shoulders and afterward at the hips. But care must be exercised not to make this twisting conspicuous. It must be gradual, deliberate and almost unnoticeable. In fact, it is difficult to believe as one writes about the stroke that all these changes of poise and balance are taking place. It is excellent practice to stand in the various positions on one’s floor and get them clearly in mind.