vm.] THE SADDLE AND SIDE-SADDLE. 87 



if, when sitting in your chair, you press your two knees 

 together, and afterwards, by crossing them over, press 

 them, one down and the other up. Besides this, when a 

 man clasps his horse, however firmly it fixes the clasping 

 parts, it has a tendency to raise the seat from the saddle. 

 This is not the case with the clasp obtained in a side- 

 saddle; and, for a tour de force, I find I am much 

 stronger in a side-saddle than in my own. There is no 

 danger in this third pummel, since there is not the 

 danger of being thrown on it ; more than this, it renders 

 it next to impossible that the rider should be thrown 

 against or upon the other pummels. In the case of the 

 horse bucking, without the leaping-horn, there is nothing 

 to prevent the lady from being thrown up ; the right 

 knee is thus disengaged from the pummel, and all hold 

 lost. The leaping-horn prevents the left knee from 

 being thrown up, and from that fulcrum great force may 

 be employed to keep the right knee down in its proper 

 place. If the horse, in violent action, throws himself 

 suddenly to the left, the upper part of the rider's body 



