PREFACE. 



of Naples, looks so well outside her horse, or manages him 

 with such perfect ease, as the fair daughter of Albion, 

 Scotia, or Erin. 



We do not pretend to teach riding, as some medicos 

 profess to cure, by written instructions. The equestrian 

 art is no more to be acquired by the sole means of printer's 

 ink and the artist's pencil — even one so deft as that of 

 Miss Sophy Turner — than are painting, sculpture, or 

 fencing. All we aim at, in these few pages, is to give the 

 tyro, and those whose faults need correction, some useful 

 wrinkles as aids in the application and development of the 

 practical tuition which must be undergone. 



There are in London, and in a few of our fashionable 

 watering-places, riding-schools where civilians can receive 

 sound instruction, and which have all the advantages of 

 capacious covered-in rides; but we are not all dwellers in 

 towns. [Moreover, much is to be learnt out of school by 

 close observation of proficients, and by putting into prac- 

 tice at home the few hints contained in these pages. 

 When the reader is in the vicinity of a garrison town at 

 which a regiment of cavalry is stationed, or near to a 

 cavalry depot, an introduction to the officer commanding 

 should be sought, who, the applicant finding his own horse, 

 might be disposed to permit of his joining " the ride." 



The art of equitation, as now taught in the British army, 

 is of the highest. Harshness and undue severity are no 

 longer permitted in the military school ; the lessons are pro- 

 gressive and thoroughly explained by question and answer ; 

 the muscles, by an admirable system of gymnastics and 



