practice can give the instinct which prepares a rider for the most
sudden starts, leaps, and "kickings up behind and before."

The style of a man's seat must, to a certain extent, be settled by his
height and shape. A man with short round legs and thighs cannot sit down
on his horse like tall thin men, such as Jim Mason, or Tom Oliver, but
men of the most unlikely shapes, by dint of practice and pluck, go well
in the hunting-field, and don't look ridiculous on the road.

There are certain rules laid down as to the length of a man's
stirrup-leathers, but the only good rule is that they should be short
enough to give the rider full confidence in his seat, and full power
over a pulling horse. For hunting it is generally well to take them up
one hole shorter than on the road.

The military directions for mounting are absurd for civilians; in the
first place, there ought to be no right side or wrong side in mounting;
in both the street and hunting-field it is often most convenient to
mount on what is called the wrong side. In the next place horses trained
on the Rarey plan (and very soon all horses will be), will stand without
thinking of moving when placed by the rider, so that the military
direction to stand before the stirrup becomes unnecessary.

The following is Mr. Rarey's plan of mounting for men, which is
excellent, but is not described in his book, and indeed is difficult to
describe at all.

_To mount with the girths slack without bearing on the stirrup._--Take
up the reins and a lock of the mane, stand behind the withers looking at
your horse's head, put your foot in the stirrup, and while holding the
reins in one hand on the neck, place the other open and flat on the
other side of the saddle as far down as the edge of the little flap,
turn your toe out, so as not to touch the horse's belly, and rise by
leaning on your flat hand, thus pressing hard on the side of the saddle
opposite to that on which you are mounting. The pressure of your hands
will counterbalance your weight, and you will be able to mount without
straining the girths, or even without any girths at all. If you are not
tall enough to put your foot fairly in the stirrup, use a horse-block,
or, better still, a piece of solid wood about eighteen inches high, that
can be moved about anywhere.

Young men should learn to leap into the saddle by placing both hands on
the cantle, as the horse moves. I have seen Daly, the steeplechaser, who
was a littl