Riding for Women and Children 137 



should always begin upon a pad of thick steam 

 felting girthed about an animal narrow enough 

 through to afford some chance for the little legs 

 to get a steadying hold. Their next promotion 

 should be to the saddle with stirrups, and the grad- 

 uating course should include the saddle without 

 stirrups or girths. When any boy or girl can trot 

 and canter on a stirrupless and girthless saddle, 

 and feel quite at ease, he, or she, has made greater 

 advances in equestrianism than one in a thousand 

 ever does — and yet only what it is easily possible for 

 any one to accomplish. 



The trouble with us all is that we are in such a 

 terrific hurry about everything, and rush through 

 and over all obstacles from the cradle to the 

 grave, as if " repose of manner " were an undesirable 

 accomplishment, and not to be cultivated. Thus we 

 dash into a riding-school, and inquire the rates for 

 " learning to ride." and are told that twenty lessons, 

 at about twice as many dollars, will put us in line 

 for public parade upon the average school hack, — 

 those patient sufferers, whose haggard eyes and 



