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Whenever a lady is dragged by skirt or stirrup and killed an accident which, happily, occurs but rarely nowadays, for we wisely adopt the best safety appliances to prevent it up crops that evergreen question of cross-saddle riding, as if men never come to grief!
Once Miss Welland stopped to adjust her traveling-bag which had shifted a little in the straps. "Is riding cross-saddle uncomfortable for you?" asked Miss Van Arsdale. "Not in the least. I often do it at home." Suddenly her mount, a thick-set, soft-going pony shied, almost unseating her. A gun had banged close by. Immediately there was a second report.
Kut-le stood holding the bridle of a sedate little horse on which he had fastened a comfortable high-backed saddle. "Come, Rhoda," he said. "I'll shorten the stirrups after you are mounted." Rhoda stood with her back to the wall, her blue-veined hands clutching the rough out-croppings on either side, horror and fear in her eyes. "I can't ride cross-saddle!" she exclaimed.
Up to that time any female over the age of nine caught riding a horse cross-saddle would have lost her character good and quick. And these pioneers lost any of theirs that wasn't cemented good and hard with proved respectability. I remember hearing Jeff Tuttle tell what he'd do to any of his womenfolks that so far forgot the sacred names of home and mother.
Then, again, a woman's limbs are unsuited to cross-saddle riding, which requires length from hip to knee, flat muscles, and a slight inclination to "bow legs." I practised my cross-saddle riding in a school well supplied with large mirrors in which I could see my figure as I passed.
"There's nothing wrong with my legs," said Prince Ferdinand William Otto, staring at the nets habit. "But yours look rather queer." Hedwig flushed. The truth was that she was wearing, for the first time, a cross-saddle habit of coat and trousers. And coat and trousers were forbidden to the royal women. She eyed Otto with defiance, and turned an appealing glance to Nikky.
Whatever may be said in favour of cross-saddle riding, we must bear in mind that it was not until the introduction in 1830 of the leaping head that women were able to ride over fences, and it would be a most reactionary measure to try to dispense with this valuable improvement on the ancient and incompetent order of things.
Fashionable bootmakers who build boots for ladies on the pattern of those worn by men, seem to be unaware of the fact that a woman's grip in a side-saddle is entirely different from that of a man in a cross-saddle, and many ladies suffer unnecessary discomfort by meekly accepting what they are told is "the proper thing." Our friend Mr.
Despite the handicap of his weight, this victory was due to his splendid back and abdominal lifting muscles. Immediately after this, however, he was brought to grief by Mark Hall's sister, a strapping young amazon in cross-saddle riding costume, who three times tumbled him ignominiously heels over head in a bout of Indian wrestling.
Like her father and brother and Hamil she was mounted on an unornamental but wiry Tallahassee horse; and she rode cross-saddle, wearing knee-coat and kilts of kahkee and brown leather puttees strapped from under the kneecap to the ankle. Like the others, too, she carried a small shotgun in a saddle boot, and in the web loops across her breast glimmered the metal rims of a dozen cartridges.
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