Books published by Long Riders' Guild Press

This is quite simply the most important book ever written in the English language by a military man on the subject of equestrian travel. It was designed to be used by the United States cavalry. Yet it differs from traditional manuals in that it has says nothing about drills and everything about horse journeys. If you want to learn how to properly pack and ride a horse over extremely long distances, then you are holding the cavalry man's sacred text in your hands. At the dawn of the 20th century experts were busy predicting the imminent demise of the horse. Mankind's most historically influential comrade would make way for the automobile, cynics said. Yet the young author of this remarkable volume disagreed with the critics. No machine of steam and steel, of cog or cam, no vapor-fed motor, no craft propelled by batteries or boilers would ever successfully displace the horse from our on-going needs, advised Boniface. Part text book, part history book and all inspiration, "The Cavalry Horse and His Pack" is the lasting tribute to the great horseman and talented writer who foresaw the day when horse travel would once again flourish and a book such as this one would be cherished by unforeseen generations of Long Riders, cavalry students and horse lovers.

Es un libro que The Long Riders' Guild Press ofrece a los niños: está escrito para ellos. Los mil episodios plenos de aventura y de sana emoción que se sucedieron durante los dos años que duró el arriesgado viaje están narrados, como se hace en las fábulas, por Mancha y Gato: ellos mismos relatan sus peripecias. Era un maestro de escuela que ambicionaba realizar una gran empreso. ¿Cuál podia ser? Su espíritu romántico, con algo de aventurer y no poco de héroe, lo espoleaba de continuo. Se decidió por fin. Aimé Tschiffely era entre nosotros uno de esos extranjeros con corazón argentino: amaba lo nuestro, y, como algo muy nuestro, al "caballito criollo". Formuló un aserto y se propuso demostrarlo: "El caballo criollo argentino es de una guapeza y resistencia a toda prueba - dijo - y no cede a ninguno en el trabajo duro y continuardo en cualquier condición". Para demonstralo eligió a Mancha y Gato, y llevado por ellos unió en un raid sin precedentes en los anales de la equitación, las dos extremas capitales de las repúblicas americanas: Buenos Aires y Wáshington. Confió, como él mismo lo dice, su salud y aun su vida al generoso y noble aguante de estos dos caballos, hijos de la Patagonia. Ni la humedad insalubre de las selvas tropicales y de las regiones lacustres y pantanosas, ni el sol abrasador de los desiertos ni los precipicios y ventisqueros de las montañas ni el hambre ni la sed ni el frío fueron suficientes para debilitar el entusiasmo del hombre ni para doblegar el aguante de sus dos caballos. Mancha y Gato llevaron a su dueño hasta la meta después de un recorrido de 18.000 kilómetros. Odisea admirable que sólo pudieron realizar la voluntad de un idealista y la guapeza del "caballito criollo".

Once they were famous from the Atlantic to the Pacific. If you had asked any American school children in 1911 who Bud and Temple Abernathy were, they would have given you a look of disbelief. "Everyone knows the Abernathy Boys," they would have said. And they would have been correct, because the mounted adventures of the little Long Riders from Oklahoma Territory had taken the United States by storm. On their first equestrian journey in 1909 the tiny travelers, aged nine and five, encountered a host of Old West obstacles, including wolves and wild rivers, when they rode more than 1,000 miles from Oklahoma to Sante Fe and back - ALONE! The following year the intrepid brothers set their sights on New York City, which they reached after a month of hard riding. Along the way Orville Wright offered to take them up in his new-fangled airplane and President Taft gave them a warm welcome when they reached the White House. Kids envied them. Women adored them. Grown men pulled hair from their horses' tails to keep as souvenirs. This public frenzy culminated when Bud and Temple rode their Oklahoma ponies alongside Teddy Roosevelt and the Rough Riders in a victory parade witnessed by more than a million cheering New Yorkers. Even though they were only six and ten years old, Temple and Bud Abernathy were a national sensation. In the summer of 1911, they did the impossible. They rode nearly 4,000 miles, from New York to San Francisco, in only sixty-two days. Once again, the Abernathy Boys had made a historic ride without any adult assistance and accomplished an equestrian feat which has never been equaled. Now this superbly-written version of their remarkable story, penned by a member of their family in 1910, has been reissued in conjunction with the creation of a life-sized statue being raised in honor of the world's youngest equestrian travelers. "The Abernathy Boys were mounted heroes whose memory deserves to be cherished by a new generation of children and horse lovers," said Basha O'Reilly, a Founder Member of The Guild and Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, who rode from Russia to England. This new edition celebrates the equestrian legacy of Bud and Temple Abernathy.

Few places on Earth were more dangerous in 1983 than Peshawar, Pakistan. With a savage war being waged a few miles away between the Soviet Union and the Afghan mujahideen, Peshawar had become the new Casablanca. When she wasn't being bombed, her narrow streets hosted a swirling human cocktail of turbaned freedom fighters, tight-lipped foreign mercenaries, naïve foreign aid workers, cruel Pathan warlords, and more spies than ever lurked in Berlin. Riding through this fiery forge was CuChullaine O'Reilly. The journalist who turned equestrian explorer was already familiar with Peshawar and the surrounding lawless portions of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province. A convert to Islam, the wandering horseman was unfazed by religious obstacles, fluent in the patois of the tribesmen, and able to partake of any local offering from luke warm goat fat to sullied ditch water. Setting off from Peshawar, O'Reilly began an equestrian odyssey into a mediaeval portion of the world devoid of mercy and machinery. His mission was to ride over some of the world's highest mountain ranges, thread his way through untamed tribes, and miraculously get back to war-torn Peshawar. Yet the adventure he sought demanded a high price. His horse died and was eaten by eager natives. He was kidnapped, tortured, imprisoned in Pakistan's most infamous prison, and met murderers, bandits, whores, and princes. Yet despite these setbacks, O'Reilly never lost hope that he would complete his mounted exploration of the remote and dangerous heart of Asia. Lavishly illustrated with dozens of drawings and maps, the resulting book was compiled from the field notes, maps and diaries the author brought back from his travels. It includes an in-depth glossary of native words, and the largest collection of ethnological, historical, political, sexual, and religious information ever gathered about life in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province. "Khyber Knights" is thus a rare talisman against a world grown soft and predictable. Its pages burn with a bawdy portrayal of the darkest secrets of this cruel and beautiful region. It is a tissue of mishaps and romantic adventures, poetic passages and natural beauties, set to the echoing of horses' hooves. Told with grit and realism by one of the world's foremost equestrian explorers, "Khyber Knights" has been penned the way lives are lived, not how books are written. It makes every effort to rip the reader's nerves to rags with its ruthless devotion to the unvarnished truth about life in the North West Frontier. You do not read "Khyber Knights". You survive it!

There once rode a man whose life could not be compared to ordinary mortals. This gentleman roamed the world, saddled every breed of horse, lived through a hundred adventures, went to prison to defend his beliefs and wrote like an angel. They called him Don Roberto Cunninghame Graham and the world was a sadder place for having lost sight of his great soul. Yet how do you encapsulate such a gigantic existence onto the cramped pages of a single book? And who could possibly understand the life and times of a mounted literary legend? This stunning new biography is the answer to both questions, for the book has been written by the person who learned first hand from the Gaucho Laird himself. Don Roberto''s great-niece, Jean Cunninghame Graham, (Jean, Lady Polwarth) has written a striking biography of the man who rode with the gauchos and battled social injustice as a Member of Parliament in London. First-hand knowledge, a treasure trove of family documents, unexpected discoveries, and a delightful writing style all combine to bring the author''s famous uncle to life. "Jean''s Gaucho Laird is readable and lively, with lots of new material. It is a distinctly vivid tribute to a great man," said Professor Cedric Watts, an expert on the life and accomplishments of the man who championed Scottish home rule. Regardless of where he was, or what great adventure he was involved in, Don Roberto could be counted on to turn his keen eye and quick pen to recording the colourful life swirling around him. His great-niece has now followed in his footsteps, by bringing the Scottish Don Quixote to life at last.