reading while riding

Abraham Lincoln did it, at least judging from this equestrian statue:

John Wesley was also in the habit of reading while on horseback. In a journal entry for March 21, 1770 he writes:

Nearly thirty years ago, I was thinking, "How is it that no horse ever stumbles while I am reading?" (History, poetry, and philosophy, I commonly read on horseback, having other employment at other times.)

Myself, I would read while mounted on a camel and maybe even on a donkey, but not on a horse. It seems too unstable!

It must be an odd experience to read the Houyhnhnm section of Gulliver's Travels while on horseback.