70 THE BARB AND THE BRIDLE. 



there is anotlier thing she is better witliout, namely, a horse of any 

 sort. 



If a horse is projDerly broken, and has a man about him who will" 

 give him plenty of work, and keep him from getting above hunself, 

 and his fair owner has been as well taught as her horse, she ought 

 to be as safe on his back as in her brougham, in any kind of riding, 

 except in exceptional cases in the hunting field. By exceptional 

 cases I mean where a lady, unaccompanied by a good pilot, takes 

 a line of her own when hounds are going fast in a big grass 

 country, and rides (jealous of the field) at impracticable places. 

 In such case she is likely enough to get down, horse and all. But 

 even so — and I have witnessed more than one such accident — I have 

 never found that the lady got hurt by the spur when she wore the 

 sort I allude to ; and again, I think it is only just to that clever- 

 loriner, Mr. Latchford, to say that he has invented a lady's stirrup- 

 which renders danger from it in the event of a fall next to im- 

 possible — certainly she cannot be dragged by it. In this stirrup 

 there is no opening at the side by means of springs or complicated 

 machinery of any sort. It requires neither diagram or drawing to 

 describe it, because it is the perfection of mechanism — extreme 

 simplicity. One has only to imagine an ordinary stirrup, rather 

 elongated than usual from the opening for the leather, the bottom 

 bar broad and flat ; the latter perforated with two holes. Within 

 the above-named stirrup another, a size smaller, but fitting nicely 

 into it. On the lower side of the bottom bar of the inner 

 stirrup two projections, or obtuse points of steel, which fit into 

 the holes of the lower bar of the outer stirrup. Now, as 

 long as the lady is in her saddle the inner stirrup must, from its 

 mechanism, remain in its place ; but in the event of her being thrown 

 her weight acts upon the lower part of the outer stirrup, which turns 

 over and releases the inner stirrup entirely. 



To return, however, to the question proper of spurs for a lady, I 

 must say that they are of the greatest assistance to her when, having 

 acquired the necessary degree of steadiness on her horse, she desires 

 to ''wake him up." Too much whip is a bad thing. In riding in 

 the coimtry a lady must perforce have to open a bridle gate- 



