LADY FOXHUNTERS 27o 



when properly directed, is a very laudable ambition, a desire to 

 see their horses look well, and this they are very apt to promote 

 by over-feeding and stimulants. High feeding, however, will 

 not do for ladies' horses. They should be rather under than 

 above themselves. Still you cannot get one groom in a 

 dozen to believe this — at all events to act upon it. " Oh, 

 mistress is going to ride to-morrow," and down goes another 

 feed of corn. It would be much better to take one off and give 

 the horse a gentle canter in the morning. \\'hen her Majesty 

 rode. Miss Quentin always took the fiery edge off her steed in 

 the riding school for her. 



All sportsmen know that half the pleasure of hunting is in 

 being pleasantly carried by a horse that you have perfect 

 confidence in, and surely ladies must be equally sensible to the 

 pleasures of comfort. There can be no enjoyment if you are 

 constantly calculating when you are likely to be on your back. 

 We do not know a more frightful sight than a woman run away 

 with. 



If low condition is desirable for the road, how much more so 

 must it be if a lady enters the hunting field— a scene that is 

 enough to excite the most sedate and orderly-minded horse. 



And here we may observe that there is a wide difference 

 between ladies hunting and ladies coming to see hounds throw 

 off. They are as much in their place at the meet as they are 

 out of it tearing across country. We like to see them at the 

 meet ; it shows that they take an interest in the amusements of 

 their husbands, their brothers, or their sweethearts. The meet 

 then being open to them, it follows as a matter of course that 

 they should come on horseback. We cannot imagine poorer 

 amusement than hunting on wheels — starving in a carriage on 

 a cold winter's day, jolting about country roads, pitching from 

 one side of the vehicle to the other, wondering which ditch 

 they will go into. People in carriages seem out of their 

 element altogether ; they look as if they did not belong to the 



