28 A Tenderfoot. 



the best adapted to the work immediately in 

 hand, or to the animal ridden. A slight change 

 is often a gain. Every one has noticed that dif- 

 ferent horses, as well as different ground ridden 

 over, vary the rider's seat in the same saddle. 



But excellent as is the long hunting seat in its 

 place, one can conceive no more ridiculous sight 

 than the English swell I once saw in Colorado, 

 who had brought his own pigskin with him, and 

 started out for a ten days' ride across the prairie 

 on an Indian pony, the only available mount. 

 The pony's short gait was admirable for a long 

 day's jaunt in a peaked saddle, but so little suited 

 to a cross-country rig, that the swell's condition 

 at the end of the first fifty miles must have been 

 pitiable. This unusual " tenderfoot " exhibition 

 elicited a deal of very natural laughter, and its 

 butt, who was an excellent but narrow-minded 

 horseman, though he stuck with square-toed Brit- 

 ish pluck to his rig for a few days, came back to 

 Denver equipped a la cowboy. His Piccadilly 

 saddle had been abandoned to the prairie-dogs. 



III. 



Patroclus watches his rider's mood. He has 

 become contemplative too, and has taken kindly 

 to our sober pace. But you shall have your turn, 

 my glossy pet. Let us get off this macadamized 

 road where we can find some cantering-ground. 



