ISO RIDING FOR LADIES. 



delight at the manner in which he gathered his haunches 

 under him, and the clever way in which, on landing, he 

 planted his feet. It is really charming to watch them, and 

 most sad to think and know that by-and-by, when some 

 professedly fine, but in reality totally ignorant rider gets 

 upon their backs, every second fence or so will witness a 

 cropper, and the young, fleet-limbed, spirited creatures will 

 be beaten, and pulled at, and called " brutes," and sworn 

 at too, as though it were not the clumsy hands at their 

 mouths that were in reality bringing them to grief. 



Good hunters are, times out of number, thrown down by 

 their riders. A lady, for instance, borrows a mount for a day, 

 and hears from his owner (who perhaps knows very little 

 indeed about horsemanship) that he's a " capital goer, but 

 wants a little lifting at his fences." I have heard that idiotic 

 expression made use of hundreds, nay, thousands of times. 

 Well, out she goes ; the animal, fresh and buoyant, starts 

 away at a nailing pace, and when not interfered with goes 

 skying over obstacles from which others are turning away, — 

 but the half-frightened rider on his back has that word 

 " lifting " imprinted upon her sensitive brain, and the moment 

 the horse takes off at the first big fence, up go her hands 

 with a sudden haul at the bridle, and the animal, surprised 

 and thrown off his balance by the action, lands unevenly, 

 if he lands at all, and very likely gives her a severe fall. 



There is not one on earth who is more against permitting 

 any " slummucking," or romping, or going " abroad," than 

 I am myself ; to keep a horse well collected has always 

 been my teaching ; leave him his head when coming up to 



