86 HOKSES AND EIDING. 



saddles falls across tlie broad part of the back, 

 and not across the withers at all. 



Again, a rider often gets thrown, or is liable to 

 get thrown, on to the pommel of his saddle, and 

 with an ordinary saddle runs a much greater risk 

 of being hurt and injured than he does with a cut 

 pommelled saddle. 



You are thus saved as well from one risk of 

 being hurt as from one of the most troublesome and 

 vexatious evils attending horses and riding, that is, 

 a sore back. A horse that is ridden with a cut-back 

 saddle will not get sore withers, and a horse that has 

 got sore withers from being ridden with an ordinary 

 saddle can be ridden without making him any worse, 

 in a cut-back saddle. In addition to the pommel 

 being too high the cantle or back of the saddle is 

 generally made much too high. If you put an ordi- 

 nary saddle on a straight-backed horse the saddle 

 will only rest on the parts under the pommel and 

 middle, and the hinder part will be raised above the 

 horse's back, so that when the rider moves backwards 

 and forwards on the saddle it will go up and do^vn on 

 the horse's back something like the motion of a boat 

 at sea ; whereas the cantle ought to be flat, and the 

 saddle ought to press on the horse's back from end 

 to end, and then the weight will be distributed over 

 a large surface, instead of being all concentrated 

 in one place; and the horse would carry his load 

 easier, and be less likely to get a sore back. 



