Child's Pilch: Treeless Saddle With Stuffed Roll, Web Girth Straps and Flock Panel (Hasluck, Saddlery, 1904)

"A pilch is the form of saddle used by a boy or girl." He adds that pilches "accommodate themselves to almost any horse, though they lose their shape under a heavy weight".

Cut the top somewhat like a saddle panel but smaller, and in a straight line along the back. Put a welt at the joint and stitch it double-handed on the under side. The top can be plain stiff single leather, or covered plain with basil or hogskin (tack a cover coarsely along the edge, then bind it with leather).

Take a piece of webbing about 1 ft 3 in long and stitch a 2 in strap, 10 in long, to each end, turning the end of the web in under the stitch. Whip a second piece of web about 1 ft long to the edge of the first, at equal distances from both ends, and fit two chapes and 1 in buckles with the tongues taken off, for the stirrup straps. Stitch this to the lower part of the top, right in the centre. Bring the stirrup buckles forward and cut a hole for each to come through on the outside without the web showing; the holes must be the same distance from the centre on each side. Stitch the web firmly through the top from end to end.

Cut linen to the shape and size of the roll, double it and stitch the edges together; stuff it hard with flock and quilt it firmly. It should reach round the back and come to a fine point at each end. Draw it tight round the back of the seat, bringing the points down level at each corner of the flap part of the top, and put a stitch here and there along the bottom through the linen and the top.

Cut hogskin or basil large enough to cover the roll. Raise a stitch along the bottom on both sides of the roll in the cover and run the stitches up and down through the top, drawing the cover down tightly over the roll. Quilt the roll with stitches from side to side, a little tuft of flock under each stitch, drawn tight; fasten the thread securely at the end.

Make the panel exactly like a saddle panel (see the riding saddle blueprint). Fasten it by putting stitches through the top here and there along the front and round the back near the edge, with a small tuft of flock under each stitch on the panel and every stitch knotted over the flock as you go. Do not fasten the panel right at the bottom of the flaps, but about 5 in from it.

Make a pair of 1 in stirrup straps 1 ft 8 in long, and get a pair of boy's stirrup irons (he says they could be bought tinned for sixpence a pair). A pair of girths 1 ft 6 in and 1 ft 8 in long completes the pilch.

From **Saddlery**, edited by Paul N. Hasluck, David McKay, 1904 (archive.org saddlery00hasl), chapter IV, "Children's Saddles or Pilches", pp. 36-39, read on the scan; the chapter has no figures, so the picture is our own diagram from his text. He gives no size for the top. The reversible heads and the safe for a girl, the girl's slipper stirrup and the crupper web are not made here. The thread, tools and metric figures are ours.