SIDE-SADDLE VS. CROSS-SADDLE 79 



caught on the pommels. With the modern full apron 

 skirt, and the modern safety-bar stirrup, the danger 

 of dragging is reduced to a minimum, and is no greater 

 than that which a man runs in a cross-saddle. More- 

 over, as a woman in a side-saddle has a surer seat than 

 a woman, or even a man, in a cross-saddle, and is 

 therefore less apt to be thrown, I believe that the 

 danger of being dragged is really less, rather than more. 

 So much for the first four objections. The next four 

 charges are, perhaps, not so easily refuted. 



(5) It is true that a woman camiot mount as easily 

 and quickly as a man. But with a fairly quiet horse 

 it is well within the range of possible achievements for 

 a woman, of average height, to mount to a side-saddle 

 unassisted. We are, however, willing to grant that it 

 is no easy matter, and one not likely to be attempted 

 except at a pinch. She can, nevertheless, dismount 

 quite as easily from a side-saddle as from a cross- 

 saddle, and any assistance that may be given her is 

 usually merely a form, unless she is very stout or aged. 



(6) Likewise we are willing to admit that it may be 

 a trifle more difficult for a woman on a side-saddle 

 to drop her hands to a horse, as she has to lean pretty 

 far forward even to keep them as low as her knee; 

 and it is also true that in riding a green horse, a re- 

 fuser, or a mean one, a woman is at a disadvantage 

 in not having a leg on both sides of the animal. 



(7) The seventh charge, that if a horse falls with a 

 woman in a side-saddle she is more or less apt to be 

 badly smashed up, also has truth in it. This is not 

 due, however, so much to the presence of the pom- 

 mels, as is popularly supposed, but rather to the fact 

 that a woman's seat on a side-saddle is so very firm 

 that when the horse hits the fence she is less apt to 



