Among those who hunt there are two classes of hunting people who
always like it, and these people are hunting parsons and hunting
ladies. That it should be so is natural enough. In the life and
habits of parsons and ladies there is much that is antagonistic
to hunting, and they who suppress this antagonism do so because
they are Nimrods at heart. But the riding of these horsemen under
difficulties, horsemen and horsewomen, leaves a strong
impression on the casual observer of hunting; for to such an one
it seems that the hardest riding is forthcoming exactly where no
hard riding should be expected. On the present occasion I will,
if you please, confine myself to the lady who rides to hounds,
and will begin with an assertion, which will not be contradicted,
that the number of such ladies is very much on the increase.

Women who ride, as a rule, ride better than men. They, the women,
have always been instructed; whereas men have usually come to
ride without any instruction. They are put upon ponies when they
are all boys, and put themselves upon their fathers' horses as
they become hobbledehoys: and thus they obtain the power of
sticking on to the animal while he gallops and jumps, and even
while he kicks and shies; and, so progressing, they achieve an
amount of horsemanship which answers the purposes of life. But
they do not acquire the art of riding with exactness, as women
do, and rarely have such hands as a woman has on a horse's mouth.
The consequence of this is that women fall less often than men,
and the field is not often thrown into the horror which would
arise were a lady known to be in a ditch with a horse lying on her.

I own that I like to see three or four ladies out in a field, and
I like it the better if I am happy enough to count one or more