Edward Henry Michelsen, Once a Week, Series 1, Volume V… (1861)
“ But among all these public diversions, none was more distinguished for singularity and originality, and perhaps childish simplicity, than the procession of lads and boys on sticks or cockhorses. Thus mounted they rode, regularly divided into companies, through the streets, and halted before the hotel of the Red-Horse, where was staying the Imperial Commissioner Octavius Piccolomini, Duc d’Amali. ”
