All women are capable of enjoying the healthful exercise of horseback riding excepting those who may be suffering from disease. Every lady who has the means, whether young or advanced in years, should learn riding, for its sociability, healthfulness, and pleasure, without regard to her bodily conformation. It is folly to deprive one's self of this high enjoyment and captivating exercise, simply because one is no longer young, has only an ordinary figure, or because some persons appear to better advantage in the saddle, and ride with more ease and grace. According to such reasoning, one might as well cease to exist. If a lady cannot attain perfection, she can strive to come as near to it as possible, and if she secures a correct seat in the saddle, and a suitable horse, she will present a decidedly better appearance than one who, although having the slender, elegant figure so well adapted to the saddle, yet rides in a crooked, awkward attitude, or on a rough moving horse.
To become a complete horsewoman it is not necessary to begin the exercise in childhood. The first lessons may be taken in the twelfth year, though many of our best horsewomen did not begin to practice until they were eighteen years old, and some not until after they were married. Riding-teachers state that persons past their first youth who have never ridden learn much more readily, and become better riders than those who, though younger, have been riding without instruction, and in an incorrect manner, and, consequently, have contracted habits very difficult to eradicate.
Before closing this part of the work, there is one subject to which the author would earnestly invite attention. When a lady possesses a horse which has been long in her service, and been treated with the kindest and most loving care, and she finds that this faithful servant is becoming old and stiff, or that, from some accident, he has become almost useless to her, she should not part with him by selling him, for the ones to buy him will be those who have no sympathy for a horse and do not know how to treat him properly, but purchase him for hard and severe labor; their poverty compelling them to this course, as they cannot afford to buy any but old and maimed horses of very little value. To a well-treated and trained animal, the change from caresses to harsh treatment, from the pleasant task of carrying the light form of his mistress to the hardest of drudgery, must be acutely felt. The horse which has been kindly and intelligently managed is one of the most sensitive of living creatures, and has been known to refuse all feed and die from starvation, when placed under the charge of a cruel and ignorant master.
When the lady finds her favorite steed permanently useless, and cannot afford him an asylum in which to pass the remainder of his days in rest and freedom from labor, she should have some merciful hand end the life that it would be cruel to prolong in the hands of a hard master, simply for the few dollars that might be obtained for him. To thus destroy the animal may appear heartless, but, in reality, is an act of mercy; as it is much better for him to die a quick, painless death, than to be sold to a life of toil, pain, and cruelty, in which, perhaps, he may pass mouths, if not years, of a living death.
In terminating the present volume, the writer ventures to express the hope that her appeal to American women to seek health, beauty, and enjoyment in the saddle will not be passed by with indifference, and that the lady rider, after a careful perusal and due consideration of the instructions herein laid down for her benefit, may be awakened to a spirit of enthusiasm, and an endeavor "to well do that which is worth doing at all." To gain a knowledge of horsewomanship is by no means a mysterious matter confined to only a favored few, but is, on the contrary, within the reach of all. The requirements necessary to manage the horse are soon learned, but, as is the case with every other accomplishment, it is practice that makes perfect. Practice alone, however, without study or instruction, will never produce a finished rider; and study without practice will rarely accomplish anything. But when study and practice are judiciously combined, they will enable one to reach the goal of success, which every earnest rider will strive to attain.
In the endeavor to render the instructions and explanations in this work as clear and comprehensible as possible, many repetitions have unavoidably occurred; but as the book was more especially designed to instruct beginners, as well as those self-taught riders who have not had the advantage of a teacher, it was thought advisable not to leave any point in doubt, but as far as possible to render each subject independent of the others, and strongly to impress many essential points upon the mind of the reader.
To a majority of my countrywomen, with their natural tact and grace, it was only deemed necessary to point out their errors in riding; attention once called to them would, it was believed, undoubtedly lead to their prompt correction, and these riders would then cease to be victims of ignorance, constantly upon the verge of danger from incorrect methods of riding, and soon be able to excel in that most desirable and fascinating of all womanly accomplishments, secure and graceful horseback riding.
This has been the principal object of the author, who would not only have women ride well and elegantly, but with the confidence and enjoyment that true knowledge always imparts. Having spent so many happy hours in the saddle herself, she wishes others to experience a similar happiness, and if a perusal of these unpretending pages will create a zeal among her countrywomen for this delightful and invigorating exercise, and enable them to enjoy it in its highest sense, it will prove a source of much gratification to her, and she will rest satisfied that her efforts have not been in vain.