The Project Gutenberg EBook of On Horseback, by Charles Dudley Warner

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Title: On Horseback

Author: Charles Dudley Warner

Last Updated: February 22, 2009
Release Date: August 22, 2006 [EBook #3126]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON HORSEBACK ***

Produced by David Widger

ON HORSEBACK

By Charles Dudley Warner

I

"The way to mount a horse"--said the Professor.

"If you have no ladder--put in the Friend of Humanity."

The Professor had ridden through the war for the Union on the right
side, enjoying a much better view of it than if he had walked, and knew
as much about a horse as a person ought to know for the sake of his
character. The man who can recite the tales of the Canterbury Pilgrims,
on horseback, giving the contemporary pronunciation, never missing an
accent by reason of the trot, and at the same time witch North Carolina
and a strip of East Tennessee with his noble horsemanship, is a kind of
Literary Centaur of whose double instruction any Friend of Humanity may
be glad to avail himself.

"The way to mount a horse is to grasp the mane with the left hand
holding the bridle-rein, put your left foot in the stirrup, with the
right hand on the back of the saddle, and---"

Just then the horse stepped quickly around on his hind feet, and looked
the Professor in the face. The Superintendents of Affairs, who occupy
the flagging in front of the hotel, seated in cane-bottomed chairs
tilted back, smiled. These useful persons appear to have a life-lease
of this portion of the city pavement, and pretty effectually block it up
nearly all day and evening. When a lady wishes to make her way through
the blockade, it is the habit of these observers of life to rise and
make room, touching their hats, while she picks her way through, and
goes down the street with a pretty consciousness of the flutter she
has caused. The war has not changed the Southern habit of sitting
out-of-doors, but has added a new element of street picturesqueness in
groups of colored people lounging about the corners. There appears to be
more leisure than ever.

The scene of this little lesson in horsemanshi