Transcriber's Note: The 15 pages of advertisements preceding the titlepage have been moved to the end of this book.
LADIES ON HORSEBACK.
LEARNING, PARK-RIDING, AND HUNTING, WITH HINTS UPON COSTUME,
ANDNUMEROUS ANECDOTES.
BY
MRS. POWER O'DONOGHUE
(Nannie Lambert).
AUTHORESS OF "THE KNAVE OF CLUBS,"
"HORSES AND HORSEMEN,""GRANDFATHER'S HUNTER,"
"ONE IN TEN THOUSAND," "SPRING LEAVES,"
"THOUGHTS ON THE TALMUD," ETC., ETC.
LONDON:
W. H. ALLEN & CO., 13, WATERLOO PLACE, S.W.
1881.
[All rights reserved.]
LONDON:
PRINTED BY W. H. ALLEN AND CO., 13, WATERLOO PLACE, S.W.
TO MY FRIEND
ALFRED E. T. WATSON, ESQ.,
AUTHOR OF "SKETCHES IN THE HUNTING FIELD," ETC.,
TO WHOM I OWE
MUCH OF MY SUCCESS AS A WRITER,
THESE PAGES
ARE GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED.
INTRODUCTION.
In preparing this work for the press, I may state that it is composedchiefly of a series of papers on horses and their riders, whichappeared a short time since in the columns of The IllustratedSporting and Dramatic News. How they originally came to be writtenand published may not prove uninteresting.
One day, in the middle of February 1880, a goodly company, comprisingmany thousands of persons, assembled upon the lawn of a nobleman'sresidence in the vicinity of Dublin; ostensibly for the purpose ofhunting, but in reality to gaze at and chronicle the doings of a verydistinguished foreign lady, who had lately come to our shores. I wasthere, of course; and whilst we waited for the Imperial party, I amusedmyself by watching the moving panorama, and taking notes of costume andeffect. Everybody who could procure anything upon which to ride, from aracehorse to a donkey, was there that day, and vehicles of alldescriptions blocked up every available inch of the lordly avenues andwell-kept carriage-drives.
There is for me so great an attraction in a number of "ladies onhorseback" that I looked at them, and at them alone. One sees gentlemenriders every hour in the day, but ladies comparatively seldom; everyhunting morning finds about a hundred and fifty mounted males ready forthe start, and only on an average about six mounted females, of whomprobably not more than the half will ride to hounds. This being thecase, I always look most particularly at that which is the greaternovelty, nor am I by any means singular in doing so.
On the day of which I write, however, ladies on horseback were by nomeans uncommon: I should say there were at least two hundred presentupon the lawn. Some rode so well, and were so beautifully turned out,that the most hypercritical could find no fault; but of themajority—what can I say? Alas! nothing that would sound at allfavourable. Such horses, such saddles, such rusty bridles, suchriding-habits, such hats, whips, and gloves; and, above all, suchcoiffures! My very soul was sorry. I could not laugh, as someothers were doing. I felt too melancholy for mirth. It seemed to memost grievous that my own sex (many of them so young and beautiful)should be thus he