 Preface of Pleasure Cycling. In this little book, the writer, looking back to his own days of inexperience in cycling, has endeavored to furnish some useful information and advice to those who intend joining the army of wheelmen, or who, in their first season on the road, are beginning to appreciate the healthy pleasure which cycling brings. The book being especially intended to aid the amateur rider of the safety bicycle in the intelligent use of his wheel, the writer has kept that purpose closely in view, and has not included matters aside from it, such, for example, as the history of the development of the bicycle, and training for track and road racing. Further, the writer has attempted, perhaps too emphatically as some may think, to commend the merits of bicycling as a means towards innocent enjoyment and healthy living. But if, to persons as yet ignorant of the art and mystery of wheeling, he may seem to speak extravagantly, he is sure that his book will not be the subject of such reproach from those to whom, as to himself, the bicycle has brought a new and durable pleasure into life. The book has been written solely for the instruction and benefit of cyclers in pursuit of health and pleasure, and, whatever criticism the opinions expressed in it may meet, they have at least the merits of honesty and independence. The writer's acknowledgments are due to the Pope Manufacturing Company of Hartford, Connecticut, for permission to reproduce the illustrations contained in the book, and to friends, for advice and suggestions generously given while it was in preparation, H.C., March 1895. The Wheelman. murmurs of leaves and of brooks, the rhythmical beat of the breakers, pounding the curve of the shore, and the sea-birds restlessly wheeling, bells of the kind on the hills and the click of the sides in the meadow, scents of the fern from the pasture, the wild roses bloom in the thicket, resinous breathing of pines, cool cloud shadows crossing the mountains. He's his as he rides, self-contained and exelting in motion, winds softly touching his face to whisper the secrets of summer, straight through the shadow and sunlight, swift as the birds and as silent. H.C., March 1895. End of Preface. Chapter 1 of Pleasure Cycling by Henry Clyde This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 1 The Poetry of Motion. Never was the man of spirit the victim of ennui if his body was exposed to fatigue. Never did the man healthy of body fail to find life light if he had something to engage his mind. Alexandre Dumas. Of the million bicycles, or their abouts, in use in the United States during the summer of 1894, some hundreds were ridden on the roads or racetracks by amateur or professional racing men. Many thousands were used, wholly or in part, in the business of their owners, that is, in going to and from offices, shops or factories at morning and evening, carrying messages, making orders, visiting patients, and making pastoral visits. But probably three-quarters of the million wheels were devoted to pleasure riding. And if the use of the bicycle for this purpose increases, as it seems bound to do, cycling is to become distinctively our national sport. It may not become, or may not long remain, popular with the class which seeks only those sports that are made impossible to others by reason of their expensiveness or the need of special surroundings for the practice of them, but the inherent delight of riding is to be witching to be abandoned by most of those who have once experienced it. It is about the wheel, as a means of amusement and exercise, that this little book is written. But not only as a sport is cycling destined to furnish innocent and exquisite pleasure to thousands of men and women whose enjoyments here too for, through the stress of narrow circumstances or of absorbing avocations, have been very limited. Not only is it to bring better health and sounder constitutions to this generation of young and middle-aged Americans, it is to be the saver of time and muscle to busy men who will adapt the wheel to a hundred purposes in their daily work for which they have been accustomed to use their own unassisted legs and lungs. When the bicycle has fairly taken its place as the popular vehicle of the day, the roads and highways must be adapted to it, and there will no longer be room for the reproach, now too true, that the common highways of the United States are vastly inferior to those of England and the continent of Europe. The bicycle is now in use in nearly all the armies of Europe and in that of Japan, and it is likely that, within a short time, a bicycle-core of couriers and scouts will become a part of the regular army of the United States, in spite of the difficulties which now attend movement by the wheel over the rough country in the west, and the bad roads which are the rule rather than the exception throughout the interior of the country. In his annual report for 1892, Major General Miles said, quote, the results obtained under the most adverse and discouraging conditions prove conclusively that the bicycle will in the future prove to be a most valuable auxiliary in military operations, not only for courier service, but also for rapidly moving organized bodies of men over the country, and footnote. The safety bicycle is without doubt the safest road vehicle yet invented. It is fair to assume that nearly all the serious road accidents happening to cyclers have been recorded in the newspapers of the day, and it will be found that by far the greater number of these have occurred by reason of the unskillfulness of the rider or his gross carelessness, as by coasting in the night, or in failing to give warning of his approach in a frequented street. It is, of course, fair to exclude from the reckoning accidents occurring to professional or amateur racers competing with each other at close quarters or to record-breakers on the road. Cycling adapts itself to all sorts and conditions of men. No other outdoor sport, unless it be the gentle croquet, can be practiced at all without a violent degree of physical exertion. This is especially true of baseball, football, and tennis, but on a wheel you may jog along a country road at a five-mile gate, or you may emulate Zimmerman upon the racetrack. You may spin without conscious effort along a suburban boulevard, or you may, with the utmost exertion of wind and muscle, climb along a clivity to dash breathlessly down on the other side. You may content yourself with a ten-mile ride each day, or may train for a succession of century runs. Whatever measure of time and speed you adopt for yourself, you will find the sport a delight which grows with time and experience. The wheel-man and his wheel are one in a much closer degree than the equestrian and his horse. For, as between the horse and his rider, there is often, if not always, a conflict of wills. Whereas your wheel is, to all extents and purposes, a part of yourself, and answers as if by instinct to your every whim and purpose. Its power is so much added to your own, and as you vault into the saddle and feel the pedals under your feet, you mount into a realm of new possibilities. The petty vexations of life may pursue you on the road, but they cannot overtake you, for the black care that is said to sit behind the horseman cannot find room on the bicycle. Doleness, lassitude, headache, fly away on the breeze which your own motion creates. On the wheel, at least, you will find your own thoughts welcome companions, and whether you ride alone or in company, you will never be lonely. You will find in this sport not only pleasure, but health. Every man possessed of two legs and a sound heart may take to the wheel with the assurance that his legs will grow stronger, his wind and digestion better, and his nerves less important in it. The tonic effect of the sport upon all the functions of the body is simply amazing. If a jaded business or professional man, overwrought and weary with his year's work and looking forward with apprehension to his work to come, will devote at the beginning of the season two hours each day to the wheel, he will find in August that his accustomed outing at seaside or mountains is no longer a necessity, and if he takes it it will be with his wheel as a companion. Among the many benefits which cycling is to confer on us Americans, not the least is this, that it will confute the absurd notion that athletic and manly sports are exclusively for very young men, a notion which has never obtained in England, where men of seventy shoot all day over rough land or ride to hounds, or like Gladstone, are woodchoppers or indefatigable pedestrians. Quote, to say that a man is too old to ride is to state an absurdity, wheeling is easier than walking, and when a man is too old to walk he is ready to die, and he is never ready to do that." Scarcely less notable than its physical benefits is the influence for moral good which cycling brings to every community where it is practiced. The sport fosters wholesome thoughts and insane habits of living, and the purely healthy excitement which it brings in such large measure makes unattractive that gross artificial excitement which is the chief attraction to the use of stimulants. Says a prominent clergyman, footnote, Reverend Dr. Heisman and footnote, in one of our cities, quote, many a saloon with its baneful adjuncts of bedding and gambling, has been forced to loosen its hold upon young manhood since the advent of the wheel, and street corners, once foul and disgusting spots, have become clean and wholesome just because a clean and wholesome exercise has been provided for many who idly drifted into the company of the profane and the degraded, end quote. Except rainy days, all times are good times to be the wheel-man. Dusty roads will never stop him, and a degree of heat, which would overpower him walking, produces but the slightest discomfort as he spins along in the breeze that he creates for himself. And that is a very muddy road through which the experienced wheel-man cannot pick his way. Even sandy roads, which are in abomination in very dry weather, afford the best of riding after a smart rain. In early summer you may rise with the lark, or rather with the robin, and ride through the cool sweetness of the early morning along country roads where the wild roses and buttercups are freshened by the dew, and the scent of newly mown hay fills the air. Twenty miles you make out and home, before the work of the day has fairly begun for lazy people who know not the pleasures of the road and the wheel. Or you may ride in the August twilight when the sunset glows crimson in the west, or the great thunder-clouds warn you to hasten home along roads where the air is heavy with the sense of the latter wild flowers and the whooper-wills are beginning to sing and the frogs to croak in the marshes. In the cooler air of September you will ride longer and farther under the rolling fair-weather clouds through miles of golden rod and asters, or along high bluffs or sandy beaches in sight of the soft-sounding sea. But best of all perhaps are the October days, the way side woods blaze with color, the maples are scarlet and the beaches gold, the sumac glows red by the roadside, and the russet of the oaks warms into a royal crimson under the bright sun. The pines fill the air with a stimulating fragrance, the wind just breathes through them as you run softly through a wood road over the brown needles which they have been patiently dropping for you through many tree generations. The tinkle of a cowbell in a neighboring pasture only accents the silence. You will not be lonely, although your only companion may be a red squirrel which assays to race with you along the stone wall, or an occasional rabbit sitting on his haunches in the undergrowth to see you pass. On a clear November morning, when a white frost has ushered in an Indian summer day and the roads are beaten hard by the heavy autumn rains, you may start for a fifty-mile run knowing that your wheel will be all alive under you and that fatigue will fly away on the cool breeze. The dead leaves rustle under your wheels. The late apple-gatherers are at work in the roadside orchards. The blue smoke from burning leaves and rubbish rises here and there in the stripped cornfields. The distant woods are shadowed in soft grays and purples. In the early afternoon you stop at a country tavern that keeps a good fire and a hot dinner ready for travelers, then a rest and a smoke, if you will smoke, and home again in the cool early twilight. There, after you have changed and eaten, you may lie back in your easy chair conscious of a day well spent as you bask in the light of the autumn wood fire with just that delicious sense of fatigue that makes a luxury of repose, relating your day's adventures, if happily you find sympathetic ears to listen, or dreaming at intervals over the pages of some book of adventure, like Stevenson or Dumas, that fits in tea or mood. The morrow may bring its duties and cares, its bargains or its briefs or its sermon, but for the night you are carefree and you will permit nothing to disturb the serenity of your mind. Perhaps under the evening lamp you will fall to planning new excursions to come, fortunate for you if you do not hear a nor'easter rising in the night and get up in the morning to find the ground white with the season's first snow, for it is sadly true that in the winter season, generally from the middle of November to the middle of April, if you spend it north of the Potomac, you must practically lay up your machine and forego the delights of cycling. Some enthusiastic riders, to be sure, will watch and wait for every favorable turn of winter weather and ride even on the snow-covered roads when these are in any way practicable. But the winter days, especially in the climate of New England, afford but few opportunities for comfortable riding, and most of us must let our wheels rest while we plan excursions for the faraway spring. If we are fortunately within reach of a riding-school or a rink, we may enjoy an occasional spin on its hard floor, a poor substitute for the country road but better than nothing. But if the cycler has to endure a winter of discontent, the spring brings to him a brighter promise than to others. In the dawn of the murky March mornings he hears the calling of the early crows making their northward journey, and they become for him healthy and birds. Muddy roads do not annoy him, for the worse the ways the sooner they will become settled. He hears with satisfaction the remark, uttered oftener and oftener, the bicycles will soon be out, and he resolves to devote his next holiday, not to say the next Sunday, to cleaning and setting up his machine. Soon he sees complacent boys trundling single wheels along the pavement to or from the repair shop, and then an expressman's wagon crowned with a glittering new bicycle going out of town. At length comes the morning when he beholds the avenues leading to the city all dotted over with moving wheels, and he contempts business and engagements and makes haste for home and the road. That first ride of the season on a mild spring day is an event to be marked with a red letter in the cycler's calendar. Wheeling levels all degrees, and disproves the adage that, crabbed age and youth cannot live together. Like other healthy and manly sports, this brings to the surface the boyishness latent in every man who is worth his salt. The wheelman is your modern Don Quixote, who finds his way beset with small, marvelous adventures. His fellow wheelmen, set upon the road, are for him good comrades, or objects of mild, benevolent curiosity. One has a tire mysteriously deflated, and is in vain endeavouring to find the leak under the lee of the stone wall. How ready are you to proffer him your advice and best assistance? A flock of hens, with a perversity peculiar to their breed and sex, scuttle under the wheel of that clean-cut young stranger in the crimson jersey, and one is nearly decapitated. Oh, you monkey on a bicycle! screams an old woman, the owner of the foolish fowl, as she observes the accident from her doorway. And this appears to you an exceeding funny incident in the human comedy, as you ride up, prepared to arbitrate differences between the varago and the bewildered youth. You meet a stout lady in navy blue, ambling along at a five-mile gate. Her wheel frame is festooned with parcels, apparently of groceries, and a small milk-can depends gracefully from her handlebar. You are sure that you know her, as she wheels from the highway into a lane that leads to a region of abandoned farms. You stop in a convenient shady fence-corner for a rest and a smoke. Soon comes another on a wheel numbered in the same series as your own, and you fall to discussing with its rider important questions of make and merit of machines, or the respective advantages of single and double tubes for tires, or the best means of inflicting punishment on the pestilent curves, who, on the country roads, bark and snap about your pedals. All the locosity that is in you becomes actively developed, and you chat unreservedly with the farmer hoeing his corn, or the keeper of the country grocery where you stop and buy a bad cigar. You feel a certain benevolent superiority to the pedestrians whom you meet upon the road, and as for horses you regard them as but poor creatures, knowing as you do that on your machine you may make your fifty or sixty miles a day for an indefinite period, a thing utterly impossible to a horse, and that your steed of steel will never tire or stumble or kick or balk or run away. After all, it is vain to attempt to explain to the uninitiated the delight which the gratification of what has aptly been called the bicycle passion brings to its votaries. It is a delight that grows with time and practice, and never worries. To the healthy mind and body it brings a fresh sense of power and the never-failing joy of motion. To the lover of natural beauty a closer fellowship with the trees and the flowers and the glory of the hills and sea. Perhaps it has not been more exquisitely expressed than in these verses of Ebb and E. Roxford. It's a joy to be up in the morning when the dew is still on the clover, when the air is full of sweetness that seems like a draft divine. To mount one's wheel and go flying away, away like a rover, in the wide, bright world of beauty, and all the world is mine. I sing in my carefree gladness, I am kin to the wind that's blowing, I am thrilled with the bliss of motion like a bird that skims the down. I feel the blood of a gypsy in my pulses coming, going. Give me my wheel for a comrade, and the king may keep his crown. CHAPTER II CHOSING A BICYCLE You may talk about your ships of state and how they plow the main. You may talk about your big balloons and eek your railroad train. You may jolly up your trotting horse and speed him till he reel. But when you're after health and fun, there's nothing like the wheel. JOHN HENDERSON GARNSEY It is not the purpose of this book to give a detailed history of the development of the safety bicycle of 1895 from the cellaripede and dressine of 1816 and the machines called hobby horses, in all of which the rider sat on a perch between the two wheels and propelled the machine by thrusting with his feet against the ground. Through the lullament philosophy of 1866, to which it is believed the pedal motion was first applied, and in which the essential elements of the modern safety first appear. Nor is it worth the while to devote space to the high wheels or ordinaries so common ten years ago, but which have now nearly disappeared from the roads. An exhaustive and accurate history of the bicycle may be found in Luther H. Porter's Wheels and Wheeling, and to that book the reader who may be interested in the subject is referred. Neither is it possible to attempt here a description in detail of the different bicycles now on sale in the English and American markets. The illustrated catalogs and circulars issued by their respective manufacturers sufficiently and fairly describe the details and peculiarities of the different wheels, so that an intending purchaser studying and comparing the catalogs can get a very good idea of the characteristics of the best known bicycles. The principal parts common to most models of the safety bicycle are the frame built from steel tubing and answering to the body of an ordinary wheeled vehicle. Frames are built of different heights to suit the reach of different riders. At the base of the frame the sprocket bracket or crank bracket carrying a shaft or axle which answers to the main shaft in any system of machinery, and on which is fixed a sprocket or toothed wheel, and the pedal cranks and pedals. The wheels, generally 28 inches in diameter, the rear being the driving and the front the steering wheel. The head, consisting of the handlebar and the vertically set tube which carries it. This vertical tube slides into and is clamped to a tube which passes through the forward tube of the frame called the steering post and makes the top of the fork which being turned with the movement of the head takes the steering wheel with it. The chain which transmits the power from the sprocket to the rear sprocket a smaller toothed wheel set on the rear axle of the machine. The saddle post or the tube of the frame into which slides the saddle rod or tube carrying the saddle which is adjustable to any convenient height. The pneumatic tires. The valves passing through the wheel fellows by the application of an air pump to which the tires are inflated. The step usually a tubular prolongation of the left hand rear axle nut. The double part of the frame carrying the real axle bearings is called the rear fork. Foot rests or coasters set upon the steering fork and brake work may be added. Also lantern clip, bell and cyclometer to measure distances. The principal devices upon which the utility of the modern safety depends are first the system of gear and the transmission of power by the endless chain. Secondly the application of the ball bearing and thirdly the pneumatic tire. By the use of the gear and chain a wheel of small diameter say 28 inches is made the equivalent of a wheel of from two to three times its own diameter such as was used in the high wheels of ten years ago. Although this is affected with some comparative loss of power through friction and lost motion. By suspending the wheel and sprocket axles and the spindles of the loose pedals within circles of steel balls accurately turned and revolving on one another and suitably enclosed within cones and cases the friction of the moving parts has been reduced to the great advantage of the durability of the machine and ease in propulsion. The vibration of the rigid frame of the bicycle when running upon ordinary roads almost unendurable in the primitive machines was greatly lessened by the application of the cushioned tire and is made nearly inappreciable by the use of the pneumatic footnote. Before the application of the pneumatic tire various devices of spring forks frames and saddles were applied in conjunction with the cushioned tire to take up vibration and many machines thus equipped are still to be seen upon the road and footnote. The best mechanical ingenuity and the most exquisite technical skill have been applied to devising and perfecting the parts of the modern bicycle. Had not this been so the practical difficulties in transmitting power through the complicated and wasteful mechanism of the machine could not have been overcome and like the old velocities the cycle would have been but a toy useless for practical road work. The initial force which moves the bicycle is a foot pressure or push applied to a loose pedal set at the end of a crank and moving the shaft or axle on which is set the toothed wheel called a sprocket. This is a lever movement in which the pedal crank is the long arm and the radius of the sprocket the shorter arm the weight here being the force in pounds necessary to move the chain and attached gearing. In other words the whole load plus friction and lost motion. The power is then transferred by an endless chain in itself one of the most wasteful methods of conveying power to a smaller sprocket wheel set on the rear axle of the machine. Here we have another lever action in which the power is applied to the extremity of the short arm of the lever this being the radius of the rear sprocket while the long arm is the radius or spoke of the rear wheel the weight being finally lifted at the end of the spoke where it meets the rim of the wheel. It is evident that this weight is equivalent to the force measured in pounds required to propel the machine and that it is just so much less than the force exerted by the rider on the pedal crank as is lost by friction or wasted motion suffered in the transmission of power through the whole train of mechanism. The great strain born by the long arm in the second lever system has been lessened by the tangential arrangement of the spokes which is not the least useful of the various devices which have been applied to the bicycle manufacturer. By the application of the ball bearings at the tops respectively of the steering post and fork the actual work of steering the bicycle has been reduced to a minimum and the durability of the working parts ensured. The frames of the best modern bicycles are built of steel or nickel steel tubing. The frame joints, axles, sprocket brackets and balls for the bearings with their cones and cases are made from steel forgings turned down to shape. For the joints however some manufacturers have adopted the lap method of joining in which the ends of the tubes are lapped and reinforced and the joint then brazed. The problem of more equally dividing the load between the front and rear wheel bearings of the machine has not yet been solved for reasons which the reader will understand if he studies carefully the arrangement of parts, the architectural plan if it may be so called of his bicycle. Even if it were possible to distribute the load equally between the two wheels it is a question whether this would result in any practical advantage. Since it is evident that as the burden thrown on the forward or steering wheel is increased the friction at the steering head becomes greater and the machine less sensitive to steering. Great ingenuity has been applied to the perfecting of the bicycle chain. The self-oiling or blockchain is now used in the best machines, each block containing a felt pad which being properly filled with oil will keep the chain sufficiently lubricated for a run of several hundred miles. The accomplished wheel man must be a bit of a machinist as well. He will learn all he can from books, catalogs and circulars, from bicycle agents and manufacturers and fellow cyclers, but most and best from carefully studying his own machine and from trying to keep it always in perfect working order. The rider, like most wheel men, may have an opinion as to which is the best bicycle in the market, but for obvious reasons he does not intend to obtrude his opinion here. Get that machine which you are convinced, upon careful inquiry, is the best of the high-grade wheels, and do not, if you can help it, let the matter of price influence your choice. Money is better invested in a good wheel in the first place than in repairs or surgeons bills afterwards. Many of what in the trade are called second-class wheels do good work, but the test of these has apparently to be made upon the road at the risk of the rider, not in the manufactory. Thus, of two bicycles of a certain manufacturer, one has done excellent service for two seasons and appears still to be in fair condition. The other went to pieces running down a moderate declivity a week after it had been put on the road. Another machine of a widely advertised make, running at an eight-mile rate on a smooth road, after a month's satisfactory service broke suddenly at the head, throwing and severely injuring its rider. Moreover, as between the high-grade and second-class wheels, there is generally in favor of the former a distinct advantage in greater ease of propulsion and more sensitive steering. A bicycle of the best manufacturer properly cared for is not likely to get out of order, unless as the result of accident or of long use. Nothing, unless it be a lame horse or a watch that refuses to run, is more vexatious to its owner than a wheel that is half the time unfit for road use by reason of some constitutional infirmity. The notion that the life of a bicycle is ordinarily but one season is altogether wrong. A first-class wheel, well taken care of, should be good for half a dozen seasons work at least, with slight expense for repairs or renewal of parts. Excellent second-hand machines are often to be had, which practically will do as good service as new ones, especially wheels which their former owners have discarded after a season's use for the latest pattern. But, unless you are able to trust your own judgment as a mechanic in the choice of a bicycle, do not buy a second-hand wheel except of the manufacturer of the machine, whose interest it is not to send out a bicycle which has not been carefully overlooked, its worn bearings replaced, and the machine properly set up and adjusted. Weight of Wheel For road riding, the machine should be adapted to the weight of the rider. If your weight is from 140 to 175 pounds, you may be absolutely sure that a wheel weighing about 30 pounds will do good and permanent service. A lighter wheel may be trusted on asphalt roads or race tracks. This rule assumes that you ride a wheel with steel rims. If you use the wood rim, or an all-wood wheel, you, of course, get rid of more weight. The safety bicycle, in the first years of its use, weighed from 70 to 80 pounds, which weight by the application of ingenious devices and improved methods of manufacture, was gradually reduced, until in the season of 1893 we find the standard road wheels weighing from 30 to 40 pounds. The notion has grown that, comparing wheel with wheel, the lighter is absolutely the better, and it is obvious that, other things being equal, the lighter wheel can be propelled with less expenditure of force than the heavier one. The adoption of the wood rim and the paring down of the parts of the machine have at length produced the road wheel of 1895, which weighs from 20 to 22 pounds. If you intend to follow the fashions in bicycles, as in clothing, that is, if you are to buy a new machine each season, you will, of course, test for yourself each new construction, and what follows is not intended so much for your benefit as for the information of those who intend to stick by their old wheels, so long as those do satisfactory service. As to the wearing qualities of the wood rim, it is at this writing, January 1895, too soon to speak, and the writer leaves the question to the reader, as one only to be answered by experience, merely remarking that, bulk for bulk, steel is stronger than any known wood, and that a steel rim, well lacquered, will always remain unaffected by dampness or weather conditions. But it may be considered as demonstrated that a set of the best wood rims, carefully used, will stand two seasons where at least. The advantage in weight to be gained by the use of the wood rim is from two to three pounds. Within certain limits, the importance of a greater or less weight in road-riding exists rather in the imaginations of riders than in reality, as is illustrated in the story of the wheel-man who stopped on a hard road to strip his machine of foot rests and lantern-clip. These he stowed safely in his pocket, and, remounting, rode away with renewed spirit. After a mile or two he observed complacently with a sigh of satisfaction that he could not have supposed that so small a reduction in weight could relieve him so much. The rider for speed and the pleasure-cycler, whether in neck-and-neck racing or to break records, work under wholly different conditions. Upon the racer the slightest unfavorable conditions may have the most damaging results. His time may be materially reduced by a wet or rough track, by a headwind, or by half a dozen other circumstances. He is to exert himself to the limits of physical endurance, and he naturally will reduce his impedimenta to the utmost, since with him every extra ounce of weight carried tells. All superfluous clothing he will cast aside, and he may even shave his head. He will, of course, choose the lightest wheel that can stand the strain of his work with the probability of not breaking down, and the number of wheels that do break down under the strain of track or road racing shows that sometimes he risks too much. The rider for pleasure seeks first in the sport safety and then comfort. Unless upon some very long hills he will not feel the difference between a 25 and a 20 pound wheel. He has to propel the weight of his own body plus the weight of his machine, say generally about 175 pounds, and he will find that a few pounds more or less will not appreciably increase or diminish the work he has to do. The truth of this assertion may be tested by taking a 20 mile run, first without any load, and then with a handicap of five pounds. You will find that the difference in load has not made the second run appreciably slower or more fatiguing than the first. It is obvious that the rider never really carries the weight of the bicycle and its load, since the greater part of the weight is supported on the ground, and the force exerted by the rider is only that necessary to propel it. When you walk, pushing your bicycle before you, this force is of the slightest, only a few ounces measured in pounds. In the saddle, the propelling force, in other words, the force necessary to overcome the resistance presented by the pedal to the foot, is measured by a very few pounds. The ratio of increase as between two machines weighing respectively 20 and 40 pounds is probably not more than two pounds. It follows that, within reasonable limits, the ease of propulsion depends more in keeping the machine accurately adjusted and well cleaned and oiled than in decreasing its weight. The momentum of a heavy bicycle will help it to overcome obstacles which will stop or overthrow a lighter machine. Thus, where two wheels weighing respectively 30 and 20 pounds were run at a slow gate against a curb stone at right angles, the heavier machine easily made the lift of four inches to the level of the sidewalk while the lighter wheel was stopped short. So the heavier wheel will run more smoothly and consequently with less jolting over a rough road. Upon the whole, if you do not ride for speed, and if you have in good order a 30 or even a 35 pound wheel, which does your work with ease and satisfies your requirements, you may as well stick to it, at least until it wears out. Gear By the gear of a bicycle is understood that application of chain and sprockets by which the speed of the rear or driving wheel is increased so as to make it the equivalent of a wheel of larger diameter. Thus, to say that a wheel has a 60 gear is to say that the rear wheel is the equivalent of a wheel of 60 inches in diameter, run without gear. That is, each revolution of the sprocket sends the bicycle a distance equal to the circumference of a 60 inch wheel. The gear of a bicycle may be determined as follows. Divide the number of teeth in the forward sprocket by the number in the rear sprocket. Foot note, this is, of course, equivalent to dividing the circumference of the larger by the circumference of the smaller wheel. And footnote, and multiply the quotient by the diameter in inches of the rear wheel. Thus, supposing the number of teeth in the front sprocket to be 17 and in the rear sprocket, 8, and the diameter of the rear wheel to be 28 inches, 17 divided by 8 equals 2 1 1 8 times 28 equals 59 and a half, which is the gear of the bicycle. Multiplying the gear by the ratio between the diameter and the circumference of the wheel, 59 and a half times 3.14 equals 186.83 inches, or 15.57 feet, which is the distance which the bicycle will travel for each complete revolution of the sprocket. It is evident that, with the above gear, for each revolution of the sprocket, the rear wheel makes 2 1 1 8th revolutions. As the distance between the teeth of the sprockets is made invariable, so as to fit the chain whatever the gear, it is evident that the higher the gear, the larger the sprocket, the longer its radius, and the greater the force to be applied from the pedal to the sprocket bracket. On the other hand, the higher the gear, the greater the distance which the bicycle will travel at each revolution of the sprocket wheel. With the 28 inch rear wheel and the number of teeth in the rear sprocket, 8, the application of the above formula gives the following table of possible gears and the distance which the machine will travel with each revolution of the front sprocket for each gear, respectively. 15 teeth gear 52 and a half distance 164.85 inches or 13.75 feet 16 teeth gear 56 distance 175.84 inches or 14.64 feet 17 teeth gear 59 and a half distance 186.83 inches or 15.57 feet 18 teeth gear 63 distance 197.82 inches or 16.48 feet 19 teeth gear 66 and a half distance 208.81 inches or 17.40 feet 20 teeth gear 70 distance 219.80 inches or 18.32 feet 21 teeth gear 73 and a half distance 230.79 inches or 19.23 feet 22 teeth gear 77 distance 241.78 inches or 20.15 feet it will be observed that the ratio of increase in nominal gear for each additional tooth is three and a half and of increase in distance traveled for each revolution 10.99 inches or about .92 of a foot it is evident that by increasing the diameter of the rear sprocket the leverage applied to its rim through the power transmitted by the chain will be increased but with each increase of diameter the front sprocket must be made correspondingly larger so as to attain the desired speed thus acquiring additional propulsive force to be applied at the pedal as the weight of parts has been lessened it has become possible to increase the size of both sprockets with a net gain of power in the rear sprocket as also to build the machine with a higher absolute gear with nine teeth instead of eight in the rear sprocket the formulas given above will give a different table of gears as thus with 18 teeth front gear 56 with 19 teeth front 59 and a ninth with 20 teeth front gear 62 and two 9s with 21 teeth 65 and three 9s with 22 teeth 68 and four with 23 teeth 71 and five 9s with 24 teeth 74 and eight 9s with 25 teeth gear 77 and seven 9s in choosing a gear much depends upon the individual taste and comfort of the rider use the gear which you find the easiest on the road judging from his own experience the writer believes that for ordinary roading a gear of about 63 is best and that with a 30 pound wheel of that gear without conscious speeding or extra effort on a long run over ordinarily good and moderately hilly roads an average speed of from 10 to 12 miles an hour may be made it is obvious on consideration that the higher the gear the greater the difficulty in hill climbing the round gears are now almost exclusively used the experiments within elliptical sprocket have not proved satisfactory a bicycle with a changeable gear has lately been invented the device consisting of an arrangement of toothed wheels set in front of the rear axle and which may be thrown into or out of the chain connection by means of a lever within the control of the rider ladies wheels are not ordinarily geared above 59 and the throw or length of pedal crank in these is generally not more than six inches the longer the throw the greater the leverage to be obtained at each pedal stroke and the higher the lift of the foot some wheels are fitted with slotted cranks so as to be adjusted for a longer or shorter throw tires as to the merits respectively of the double and single tube tires each rider must form his own conclusions for his own use the rider prefers a single tube tire of the best make believing that it is the easiest to repair when repairs are needed and that it needs repair or adjustment less frequently than the double tire it cannot creep on the wheel if properly cemented and it is almost impossible for it to leak about the valve the valve nipple and tube being made in one piece on a bicycle having the single tube tire which was run nearly 2000 miles during the season of 1894 there was not once occasion to deflate a tire and but some half dozen times to pump up the air tension this operation in each case not consuming five minutes observation among friends using the same or similar makes of machines fitted with double tubes led to the conclusion that they experienced much more trouble than this especially from creeping tires or leaks about the valves the rider has never met a wheel man using the single tire who would willingly abandon it while he has listened to many bitter complaints from the owners of double tubes footnote it is a noteworthy fact that in the prospectus for 1895 of a leading company manufacturing high-grade wheels and which supplies either single or double tube tires to suit customers it is stated that during the first part of the season of 1894 the demand for single tubes was in the proportion of 40 percent of the whole number of orders received by the company but that during the latter part of the season this proportion was increased to 90 percent and footnote it is to be observed that there is a great difference in the wearing qualities of different tires some in the market being of material or workmanship so bad that they will not easily resist tearing and puncture breaks the spoon break or indeed any break which is applied directly to the circumference of the pneumatic tire is destructive to the tire and should be used only in emergencies many such breaks if not all are uncertain in their operation and so not trustworthy many wheel men prefer to ride without a break checking speed by the friction of the foot against the tire in coasting and at other times trusting entirely to backpedaling to stop or check speed the band break first used during the season of 1893 is a leather lined steel strap applied to a drum set on the rear axle of the bicycle and connected with the brake handle set on the handlebar by a train of wires and springs it is invariable in its operation and cannot injure the tire it will stop the wheel shortly on level ground or on a moderate declivity like the spoon break it will slip on a fast run down a steep road but it may always be relied on to check speed on any grade and with the help of backpedaling to stop the wheel in a few moments with a little care in handling the machine so as to avoid bending or otherwise injuring the brake connections it is practically impossible for it to get out of order and it has been found to do as good work at the end as at the beginning of the season and this on a machine in constant use upon the whole this break is worth the extra weight which it adds to the machine which is hardly to be said of any other bicycle break yet invented racers are run without breaks and it is understood that these will not appear in most of the models of road wheels for the season of 1895 saddle use the lightest saddle in which you can ride comfortably this being a matter which will be determined only by experience on the road some riders can endure sitting the lightest scorcher saddle for a whole day without the least discomfort others will find it intolerable even for a short run if you find that you must use a heavy saddle choose one of good length set on front and back springs like the old standard columbia number 10 then which no easier saddle has ever been made or if you are a very heavy weight a garford or one substantially like it the columbia number 10 weighs about four pounds the garford even more while the lightest scorcher saddles leather now weigh from 15 to 20 ounces if your light saddle hurts you discarded it once if you persist in using it you may lay the foundation of a serious disease it is a good plan to have by you a light and a heavy saddle either of which you may use on occasion saddles have been invented to be made of woven wire and perhaps of other materials including a pneumatic saddle of rubber which the rider may use if he wishes to run the risk of its exploding under him but at present no material seems to be so satisfactory to most riders as good leather handlebar and handles as you will not ride with a stoop you will not use the dropped handlebar some bicycles are fitted with an adjustable handlebar which may be adjusted to the upright position or dropped to suit the wishes of the rider use cork handles these are easier and better than any others and if they are broken are easily replaced the height at which the handlebar should be adjusted depends much on the length of reach of the rider and it can only be said that the handles should be set at such a height that the rider sitting erect in the saddle can easily grasp them without stooping generally it may be said that with the upright handlebar the tip of the handle on the head of the machine being turned should pass about one and a half inches below the forward tip or pommel of the saddle if this last is rightly adjusted as to the length of the handlebar the rider prefers for his own use one which gives a distance in a straight line measured from tip to tip of the handles of from 22 to 24 inches pedals light rubber pedals are the most comfortable retraps the lightest toe clips may be serviceable to the racer or time maker but it is not worthwhile to use them for ordinary roading wheel guards the use of these on men's wheels is not now common if you have them keep them at home for use in a possible emergency you will not ordinarily ride in muddy weather and on a dry road they are useless and weighty encumbrance ladies wheels are equipped with both wheel and dress guards the latter covering the chain and sprockets end of chapter two chapter three part one of pleasure cycling by henry clide the slipper box recording is in the public domain chapter three how to ride some love to roam or the dark sea foam where the wild winds whistle free but a bright cool day with a smooth highway and a spin on the wheel for me fm holland there are two ways of learning to ride a bicycle you may put yourself under the charge of an instructor either in the open air or in a riding school or you may go out alone with your machine for a course of more or less rough and tumble practice on the road it is holy or nearly impossible to learn riding on the ladies common loop frame wheel without the assistance either of a professional instructor or of some practiced amateur rider in the riding school you will first be placed in the saddle and upheld by the instructor be made to ride around the track until you are able to balance with an occasional tumble and to propel your machine and you will afterwards be taught principally by practice to mount and dismount if on the other hand you are your own teacher you must learn first how to mount your wheel since reaching the saddle is a necessary preliminary to riding at all select a smooth bit of ground slightly inclining and if you are a bashful person as secluded as possible from public observation and begin standing just to strive the rear periphery of the rear wheel of your bicycle grasp the handles firmly holding the head of the machine at right angles with the frame the wheel pointing down the hill now place the ball of your left foot on the step of the machine set your teeth rise on the left foot as nearly to a standing posture as you dare and as your grasp on the handles will permit and let the machine go it is well to have the handlebar set rather high for this preliminary practice and the saddle low and the machine should carry a break you will get many a fall at first but we'll learn in a very few lessons to stand on the step and balance in that position while your wheel runs 50 or 100 feet and when you have learned this you have got a long way when you find that you can mount the step and balance there with some confidence for a hundred feet run try for the saddle from the step and for the pedals from the saddle you will fail ignominiously the first dozen times and probably get several falls but your first successful mount will be an era in your cycling career for you will have gotten the knack and your confidence in your own ability will rise by many degrees after you are reasonably sure of making a successful start and mount aided by the force of gravity try the start on level ground but you need not make a special business of this you may go out upon the road taking advantage of convenient declivities to get a start and practice the level start as you find opportunity this is of course made by placing the left foot on the step hopping with the right foot so as to propel the bicycle forward and then rising on the step as to balancing in the saddle you will be told and it is true in fact that the equilibrium of the wheel is to be maintained by turning the steering wheel in the direction towards which you are in danger of falling this at first seems inexplicable to you and you will persist in trying to save yourself by turning the wheel the wrong way at length in a happy moment the knack comes to you and thereafter you balance unconsciously that is the movements by which you maintain your equilibrium are nearly automatic although nonetheless actual and positive in their effect you will learn to dismount in the first place from the left pedal but for some little time you will probably get off the machine anyhow without attracting more observation than you can help but there cannot be a useful manual of elementary instruction in cycling a few hours patient practice will teach you more than all the professors of the art can write so in what follows the writer assumes that the beginner has learned already to balance himself in his saddle to propel his bicycle and in some fashion to mount and dismount but to those readers who have never written and who contemplate learning to do so a single suggestion may be useful do not if you can avoid it buy a new high-grade machine and take it out upon a country road for the purpose of learning to ride it you will misuse and perhaps ruin it if you are within reach of a riding school learn there at least to balance and ride after you are in the saddle do not be surprised if on your first outdoor run you get badly fatigued a mile out and return home in a bath of perspiration to get up the next morning with a pair of lame or stiff legs you have for the first time in your life perhaps been really exercising the pushing muscles and these need time to strengthen and develop ride at first on smooth and level roads then take some easy ascent make a good start for it and dismount as soon as you find that you cannot keep the wheel from wobbling turn the machine run down the hill stop for a good breath and try again you will run farther the second time than the first and if you are not tired out farther the third time than the second attack the same hill the next day and the chances are that you will conquer it if it is not too long do not get impatient you will not easily get discouraged for you will find something in wheeling even in the learning of it which increases the neophytes grit and makes him persevere the rider has never known a person attempting to learn riding who has failed in a longer or shorter time to succeed after you have learned to ride with some pleasure and confidence you may find the suggestions that follow as to the management of your machine of use most beginners are disposed to ride with a low saddle and with this pushed back as far as the saddle rod will permit thus the push upon the pedal is too much in a diagonal direction forward and downward with the result of a loss of power in propulsion and of speedily producing fatigue in the muscles of the inside of the leg just above the knee and at the ankle joint it is obvious that the most powerful and easiest push is to be obtained by a motion of the leg and foot nearly vertical and with the foot kept bent downward from the ankle as in the swimming stroke rather than at an upward bend or horizontal with the ankle bone the rider using the faulty tread described is like a swimmer who should keep his body bent at the hips at an angle of several degrees and abridge each of his strokes by an inch or two the saddle should be raised so high that at the full stroke of the leg with the foot bent downward as described the forward part of the foot will just rest easily and firmly on the pedal as a rough rule it may be said that the saddle should be so adjusted that the point of the cantile will be in a horizontal line with the top of the rider's hip bone as he stands beside it at the same time the saddle should be brought forward so far that the push of the foot will be nearly vertical instead of diagonal and with the leg extended the heel should just rest easily on the pedal at its lowest point of revolution in those saddles which are set on a tilting bracket some small advantage may be gained by tilting the saddle forward but too much tilt will render the seat uncomfortable another advantage of setting the saddle well forward is that by doing so the weight of the load is more equally distributed between the two wheels of the bicycle an advantage in riding which is recognized by those wheelmen who ride with a stoop with the l rod or tubular seat rod now commonly used the goose neck or curved spring rod seems to have had its day it is not possible to push the saddle so far forward as to secure an absolutely vertical push on the paddles and if this were possible it would not be desirable it is evident that if the push is directly vertical there will be a total loss of pushing power whenever the pedal cranks come to the direct vertical position that is there will be two dead points for each complete revolution of the sprocket on level ground the momentum of the moving machine will carry it over these and the momentary loss of power will not be noticed by the rider but in hill climbing momentum no longer aids the wheel and in fact it becomes a retarding force to drag the machine backwards and then the dead points become very much in evidence and will be sure to stop the bicycle if the hill is long enough on the other hand with a push ever so little out of the vertical there can never be an absolute loss of power when you have once determined the best adjustment for your saddle it is a good plan to indicate it on the saddle rod by making some light scratches with a file so that you need not lose time in getting the correct adjustment after you have removed the saddle for any purpose push hard on the downward moving pedal and let your foot yield to the upward movement otherwise you are making one foot undo the work of the other the reverse of this motion that is the push on the upward moving pedal with a release of force on the downward movement constitutes back pedaling and important and if you ride without a break the only means of stopping the machine quickly let your foot always cling to or hug the treadle keeping the foot bent downward as described both on the downward push and on the return unless when back pedaling as to the handlebar it should be so adjusted that sitting in the manner described you can just easily grasp it I assume that you ride for pleasure not to make records nor to see what measure of muscular effort you are capable of if you ride for pleasure you will stop when you are fatigued walk when walking is easier than riding ride slowly or fast as you feel disposed coast or not when opportunity offers if your ambition is merely to make a certain number of miles in a certain number of minutes believe me you're losing the best of a noble exercise if you would ride easily gracefully and with the best results as regards your health and comfort avoid the stoop in ordinary road riding says a well-known gymnasium instructor why will so many of you sit on your seats like monkeys on a stick and try to grind your noses off on your front wheel all this is wrong and will only bring discredit on the sport that we love so much there could no occasion arise that would necessitate your sitting on your seat with your back pumped up like a camel if the wind is blowing strong and you must ride faster for a time you should bend your body forward at the waist and carry your head well forward and down yet keep your back straight and chest out in this way you will not cut such a ridiculous figure and deep breathing will not be interfered with it is pleasant to know that the stoop fad which apparently reached its height in the season of 1893 seems to be rapidly dying out keep any wrecked position like that which a graceful equestrian maintains in his saddle sit easily letting the line of center of gravity of your body fall a hair's breadth to the front of the saddle center grasp the handles very lightly you will soon learn that a slight pressure of the hands just at the base of the fingers on the handles of the machine is sufficient after you have written for a month or two and so have acquired some confidence learn to steer with either hand leaving the other at liberty on nothing so much does the pleasure of riding depend as you're keeping all the muscles of your body relaxed except of course the propelling muscles of the legs you will understand this if when riding with a rigid grasp of the handlebar with your teeth firmly set and your back stiffened you happen to remember that you are riding wrongly and let your muscles relax the relief will be instantaneous and marvelous learn to keep the handlebar steady thus you will describe a straight track and not a zigzag if you watch the tracks made by other machines on the road you will observe that many of them run a more or less crooked course that is the riders of them are unable to steer straight the neck of straight steering is wholly in the proper management of the hands and arms if you will let your hands rest half open on the handles never grasping these hard and so permit the whole weight of the arms to depend from the wrists you will avoid all involuntary motions of the shoulders or elbow joints and it is these involuntary movements that produce wild steering sitting in this way a slight movement of the body to right or left will take the corresponding handle with it and thus you will steer by the body motion and not from the wrists learn to dismount by either pedal then by reversing the motion of mounting that is by a slight bound backward from the step keeping a good grip on the handlebar it is one thing to scramble more or less awkwardly into one saddle after an exhibition of ungraceful hopping along the ground and another to vault quietly and surely to one's place and easily catch the pedals ease and skill in mounting and dismounting show the accomplished rider and it is worthwhile to practice these assiduously in private do not be in too much haste to catch the pedals if the wheel has impetus enough for a good start you will have plenty of time to adjust your feet to the pedals gracefully without fidgeting and paddling about in search of them the following rules for mounting and dismounting as given substantially in general order ways cycle infantry drill regulations are worth keeping in mind quote to mount grasp the left steering handle with the left hand raise the rear wheel slightly from the ground with the right hand adjust the pedals to a horizontal position with the left foot lower the rear wheel and grasping both handles step to the rear of the bicycle place the right foot on the ground and the left foot on the step take three short steps forward with the right foot and rise on the left foot let the body come gently into the saddle and place the feet on the pedals or having adjusted the pedal cranks step to the left side of the machine facing front and place the left foot on the step the left leg crossing the right push forward on the steering handle rise on the left foot pass the right leg with knee bent over the rear wheel let the body come gently into the saddle and find the pedals to dismount rise from the saddle on the pedals throwing the weight of the body on the left foot pass the right leg knee bent over the rear wheel descend lightly to the ground removing the left foot from the pedal to dismount by the step carry the left foot to the step rise from the saddle on the left foot and seek the ground with the right foot at the same time checking the machine end quote for a ladies mount and dismount the following directions may be studied standing at the left of the machine advance it until the right pedal begins to descend then step into the space before the saddle place the right foot on the right pedal give a slight push on the ground with the left foot and rising on the right foot take the saddle and without haste find the left pedal the weight of the body pushes the right pedal down as you rise upon it and gives the bicycle an impulse and the left pedal rises to the place for its push to dismount slack and speed with the brake or by back pedaling and when the left pedal reaches its lowest position rise on it and keeping a steady hold on the handles swing the body out and step off the pedal or passing the right foot over the left take a slight hop to the ground in any form of dismount from the pedal be careful to take it at its lowest point or just as it begins to rise if you rise on the back downward movement you will add a sudden impulse to the machine and may have to jump quickly to save yourself general ordway thus describes the position of the mounted cycler quote head erect and square to the front chin slightly drawn in shoulders square to the front back straight with body slightly inclined forward arms straight but not rigid legs straight but stretched by their weight alone feet parallel to the axis of the bicycle the ball of the foot resting lightly on the pedal end quote you will where the ground permits wheel to the left for a full turn but you should learn to wheel either way with confidence when wheeling for a turn choose level ground if possible as the bicycle is more apt to slip when turning on a declivity than in forward riding on the turn always push hard particularly on the inward pedal and let a strong push accompany each inward shift of the handlebar when making a short turn if in making a short turn you lose your confidence in your ability to make it you will probably go down some teachers of cycling will tell you that the machine is to be steered only by the manipulation of the forward wheel others that it is to be done by the motion of the body in a sense both statements are correct the first seems obviously true since without the turn of the forward wheel you cannot deviate from the straight line but if you will steer not by a motion from the wrist but by slightly swaying the body in the saddle you will find that the wheel answers almost automatically to your movements the arm and wrist following the movement of the body and a certain although unconscious motion of the body is as necessary to the cycler in order to keep an easy balance in the saddle as to the equestrian you will discover this if you attempt to make a short wheel keeping the body in an absolutely erect position in good riding first comes the knack of balancing then with more or less practice confidence until at length you ride steer and wheel almost automatically and will find it the hardest thing in the world to tell another how to do it at this point in your experience your confidence in your bicycle will have become perfect you will as soon expect the armchair by your fireside to rise up in revolt and cast you from its embrace as your wheel to play you a trick or to refuse to answer as if by intuition to your slightest half-formed wish and the bicycle will answer your confidence so long as you keep it going here now says reverent charles f dole the parable of the bicycle the thing goes as long as you keep up the motion it goes by going once stop working once begin to let it wobble and ruin faces you a certain degree of momentum is needful so everywhere if you want to succeed you must keep up your momentum but there is more in steering than is acquired by the proper management of hands body and arms you will have noticed as has been said that in short wheels you are aided by pushing strongly on the inner pedal the reason for this it will puzzle the beginner to discover but it is really an application of foot steering if you lash or clamp the steering fork of your bicycle so that it cannot turn having the wheels in a straight line mount and start as usual and then letting go of the handles fold your hands and push you will if the machine is in the right balance move on a straight line forward just so long and no longer as you exert an equal pedal pressure with each foot the stronger push usually that with the left foot will drag the machine towards the left just as an oarsman drags the bow of his boat about with his stronger arm and you will probably overturn in that direction but you will have learned that the machine may be guided by the foot movement and you will unlash your steering head and go out on the road with that notion in mind now bend your energies say during the first 15 minutes of each run towards acquiring equal pushing power with each foot if you find the right foot the weaker practice wheeling to the right pushing as hard as you can with the weaker foot from time to time let go of the handles on a straight level course and await results trying to push as evenly as possible after many failures the time will come when you will move straight on without a flinch and you will have begun to acquire the art of riding hands off you will perfect yourself in this by occasional practice on good ground and at length by increasing pressure on one pedal or the other you will deflect the course of your wheel to that side and this is foot steering it of course can never be as reliable as body steering and it can be safely practiced only on fairly good ground but there are emergencies in which it is convenient to have the hands at liberty and you will not rest until you have mastered all the qualifications which go to make up a good rider end of chapter three part one chapter three part two of pleasure cycling by Henry Clyde this Libra box recording is in the public domain chapter three part two while the stoop is to be avoided upon reasonably level ground a leaning position has obviously its place in hill climbing this will be evident when it is considered that in mounting a hill the center of gravity of the load is necessarily thrown back towards the axle of the rear wheel thus increasing the difficulty of propulsion to counteract this it is as natural for the rider to lean forward as it is for the pedestrian walking up a steep hill at the same time you will as naturally keep a somewhat firmer grasp than usual of your handlebar both to support yourself and to prevent the forward wheel from wobbling which it will have a tendency to do if relieved from part of its ordinary load at times you will brace yourself by a strong upward pull on the handlebar as you will naturally lean forward in ascending a hill so you will lean backward in running down a steep declivity the elements of success in hill climbing are first good legs and lungs secondly knack and thirdly confidence each rider must be a lot to himself as to the way in which he will attack his hills some take a strong spurt at the foot of the hill and depend on it to carry them up others work themselves up at a slow pace by sheer strength of leg muscle you will find that mounting the same hill grows easier and easier the oftener it is done and that a new hill will often get the better of you although in fact you have again and again ridden easily up harder hills you will of course gain something by zigzagging a very steep ascent the actual muscular effort necessary to ascend an aclivity on a bicycle is generally not greater than that required in walking up the same hill and the expenditure of breath is less the difference is and this makes the difficulty in hill climbing that when walking you may stop for rest when you choose whereas on your wheel working up a steep hill if you stop you may be unable to get a new start and so may be forced to walk to the top of the hill if a hill distresses you do not be ashamed to dismount and walk you are riding for pleasure not to make a record with each week of riding you will find the work easier and will smile to think how many a hill difficulty which appalled you in the beginning has seemed to level itself before your flying wheel but there are many steep and stony or sandy hills up which you should never attempt to force either yourself or your machine a high-grade bicycle is a wonderfully strong and trustworthy machine for its weight but it was built to be used only by reasonable beings and if you are a good and well-practiced rider you may be sure that you should never drive your machine across ground to get over which distresses yourself I do not refer to very long hills on good roads where of course the endurance of the machine will outlast that of its rider a 28-inch wheel running at a 10-mile gate makes 7,240 revolutions per hour 120 and two-thirds revolutions per minute or 2.01 revolutions each second supposing the weight sustained by the two axle bearings to be 165 pounds this is distributed between the two bearings in about the ratio of one-third and two-thirds the rear axle carrying the greater weight that is 110 pounds and the front axle 55 pounds footnote this assumes that the saddle is carried well forward as it is pushed backward the proportionate weight imposed on the rear bearing is of course increased and footnote the proportion of weight sustained by the rear axle is of course increased in hill climbing the strain which the rear bearing and spokes have to stand is obviously very great even in level roading not only do the bearings carry weight in the proportion stated but the motive power is applied to the machine not by a front traction as in a vehicle drawn by a horse but directly to the axle of the wheel so that each spoke becomes the long arm of a lever of which the radius of the rear sprocket is the short arm at the end of which the power is applied to raise the weight that is the load made up of the machine and its rider it is to throw the strain of the lift as much as possible into a straight pull lengthwise through the spoke that the admirable tangential arrangement of the spokes has been devised and applied to all the high-grade machines on a level road the momentum of the moving machine helps the wheel but on an eclivity the wheel has both to carry its load and to overcome the force of gravity which drags it backward it is no wonder that spokes in sound wheels have been known to snap like twigs at the fellows under the weight of a heavy rider driving his machine up a hard hill and that such accidents are not more common shows the perfection to which the bicycle manufacture has attained you will be told at the riding schools to look always straight ahead in riding and never at the road in front of your wheel this advice is sound theoretically but it is not always possible to follow it on ordinary country roads sharp stones little ruts sand or water holes bits of broken glass lie everywhere in wait for you and you will learn with practice to avoid them almost instinctively by a turn of the hand while in the beginning if you fixed your eyes on a pebble ahead of you you would be sure by the force of some mysterious attraction to run your wheel over it soon you will be able to graze it by a hair's breath on either hand without touching it keep then an easy outlook upon the road about 30 feet in front of you and still farther ahead if you are riding a bad road over which you have to pick a path for your wheel avoid watching your front wheel it will take care of itself and watching it will tend to make you giddy or confused if you do not carry a break do not attempt coasting until you have acquired the fullest confidence in yourself and thorough control over your machine without the break the only means of checking speed is by breaking with the foot which is an ineffectual resource besides being injurious to the tires or backpedaling to make which effective on a steep grade requires great muscular effort in coasting not only have you to look out for possible collisions but the frame of a lightweight machine cannot be put to a severe test then it suffers in a run say at a 20 mile gate down a long hill the best place for the feet of the ordinary rider in his first season is on the pedals and the worst cycling accidents recorded have occurred to riders coasting without breaks or in the night to check speed in coasting do not apply the brake too suddenly if you would avoid a bad header if you have a band break apply it gradually let go of it and in a second apply it again you may use the same method with the spoon brake if it works well and freely the night rider takes the risk of accidents from bad roads or obstructions which may cut his tires or otherwise injure his machine or himself but there is no denying the strange fascination of night riding as you swoop through the darkness like a hawk unable to see the slight possible dangers that lie in wait for your wheel and so perforce relieved of all responsibility for your own safety you experience an eerie sensation which must be akin to that which the old new england which enjoyed as she sped on her broomstick through the cloudy night to a symposium of the black man's disciples on dark nights always carry a lantern observe carefully the law of the road that is on meeting a carriage or another wheel man keep to the right in passing to the left if you will do this even although it may not be absolutely necessary you will avoid the responsibility of accidents if you ride in the dark ring the bell freely after much conflict it may now be considered as settled law throughout the united states that the bicycle is a vehicle and that its rider is possessed of the same rights and charged with the same duties so far as these are applicable to him as the driver of any other vehicle in the summer of 1894 the legislature of massachusetts passed and the governor of the state approved june 14 and quote act to regulate the use of bicycles and other similar vehicles and quote it being understood that the act had the approval of the league of american wheel men by the terms of the fifth section of the act it was taken out of the power of local boards such as the street commissioners of towns and cities to prohibit the use of the wheel in the public thoroughfares a power which had at times been harshly not to say unjustly used as the massachusetts act may probably be made the foundation of similar acts in other states it is printed below in full for the information of cyclers in massachusetts and elsewhere footnote chapter 479 of the acts of 1894 section one whoever without the permit provided for in section three of this act rides in a public highway or townway street square or park a bicycle or tricycle at a rate of speed exceeding 10 miles an hour or rides such machine on a sidewalk or rides such machine in the streets squares or parks of any city when the same is not provided with a suitable alarm bell adapted for use by the rider or after sunset rides the same in any public way square or park whether within or without the limits of a city when such a machine is not provided with such suitable alarm bell shall be punished by fine not exceeding twenty dollars for each offense and shall be further liable for all damages occasioned to any person by such unlawful act section two the term sidewalk as used in this act shall mean any sidewalk laid out as such by a city town or fire district and any walk in a city or village which is reserved by custom for the use of pedestrians or which has been specially prepared for their use it shall not include crosswalks nor shall it include footpaths on portions of public ways lying outside of the thickly settled parts of cities and towns which are worn only by travel and are not improved by such cities or towns or by a butters the terms bicycle and tricycle as used in this act shall be deemed to include all vehicles propelled by the person riding the same by foot or hand power the terms park and square as used in this act shall not include any spaces under the control of park commissioners or of a park board or a special park department of a town or city having power to make regulations relative to such spaces and this act shall not in any way abridge the powers of such commissioners board or department section three the mayor of a city or select men of a town may in their discretion upon any special occasion grant permits to any person or persons to ride such machines during a specified time upon specified portions of the public ways of such city or town at any rate of speed and may annex such other reasonable conditions to such permits as they shall deem proper the city council of a city and the select men of a town may also under such conditions as they deem proper permit the use of velocities or other similar machines by children on any sidewalk in any public way square or park in such city or town section four proceedings for the enforcement of the penalties imposed by this act shall be instituted within 60 days from the time the offense is committed section five no city or town shall have any power to make any ordinance by law or regulation respecting the use of bicycles or tricycles except as provided in section three of this act and except as provided in said section three no ordinance by law or regulation here to four or hereafter made by a city or town in respect to bicycles or tricycles shall have any force or effect the liberty bill so-called enacted by the legislature of new york in june 1887 and which has been substantially re-enacted in several other states provided that quote commissioners trustees or other authorities having charge or control of the highways or park driveways and quote of central park quote shall have no power or authority to pass in force or maintain any ordinance rule or regulation by which any person using a bicycle or tricycle shall be excluded or prohibited from the free use of any of the park highways or driveways at any time when the same is open to the free use of persons using other pleasure carriages and quote and foot note it is a pretty custom on meeting another wheel man to ring him a salute on your bell if in a rapid roading you are confronted by a sudden danger you must decide on the instant how you will meet it if you hesitate you are lost if you believe you can stop in season to avoid it you will of course do so but if you cannot stop do not slacken speed except in the case that you have to avoid an impact with some solid obstacle a fast wheel will skim through sometimes almost on a planks edge where a slow one will go down if you have a narrow passage which you must make do not think how narrow it is but rather how much room it affords sight for the middle line of it keep cool and steer straight and push hard and 10 chances to one you will be all right if you hesitate and let the bicycle lose speed and wobble you will certainly come to grief in setting out for a ride see always that the nuts about the saddle connections and at the axle hubs are tight and that the head is firmly clamped to the fork if on the road the saddle begins to slip under you check speed and if necessary rise on the pedals keeping a firm grip on the handles if the head turns in the tube while you are riding at a good pace you will get a fall so quickly that you will not know what throws you bicycle falls seldom result seriously but if you find that you must fall stay to the right throw the right foot off the pedal keep a good grip on the handles and the chances are that you and your machine will come up standing if you run nearly at right angles against some solid obstacle check speed as much as you can and dismount by the step just as you strike if you keep the saddle you may be thrown forward if you have ruts or streetcar tracks to cross take them as nearly at right angles as possible if you swerve so as to let your wheels fall into the rut or a track you probably will get a bad fall so if you are riding on a badly rutted road you may have to save yourself by zigzagging from one side of it to the other a very short experience upon the road will teach you that a strong wind if against you makes hard work of wheeling while if it is at your back it equally lessens the labor of propulsion your dress should afford as little vantage for the wind as possible if you would ride easily so you will wear a cap instead of a hat and in a windy day keep your coat closely buttoned among the other disadvantages of the long skirt for ladies is that it catches the wind so readily the greatest annoyance which besets the cycler on the road is from the attacks of ill bred dogs who snap about his pedals and may dart under his wheel and so throw him this is most likely to happen on backcountry roads where the inhabitant curves are unused to the side of the wheel if you are attacked by a dog on a road commonly frequented by wheel men you may be sure that the animal is vicious and deserves to be put out of the way if you are attacked running downhill throw your feet onto the coasters there will be a happy chance that the pedal will strike the kerr on the head and perhaps as has once happened within the knowledge of the rider fracture his skull if you can make a flying shot and are attacked while on the wheel by a vicious dog intent on biting shoot him the law will justify you not so dangerous as the dogs but nearly as annoying are the flocks of hens or turkeys which when frightened by your approach invariably run in front of your wheel uttering discordant cries and gobbles but these neither bark nor bite and generally manage just to escape being run down as regards the form and rate of riding the temperament of the rider counts as a most important factor a graceful walker will be a graceful rider and a rider who has undergone the military drill will show it upon the wheel almost as much as in walking a nervous man as he is sure to be a fast walker will make a rapid rider and will find it hard to keep a pace of less than 12 miles an hour in ordinary roading indeed in cycling nerve counts as much as muscle or even more most of the riders who have made great records on the racetrack have combined to an unusual degree the qualities of alertness daring and quickness of perception to see and take advantage of an instance opportunity study a group of their photographs and you will see a set of clean cut alert faces firm set mouths and keen eyes the figures do not show excessive muscular development rather life-ness and grace for example you will not find a more beautiful figure in its way than that of Zimmerman on his wheel but it has the beauty not so much of a Hercules as of the flying Mercury thus it is impossible to prescribe for anyone a rate for road riding you will find your wheel answer to your feeling as much as if it were a part of your own nervous system and your temperament will govern your pace when you are sluggish and weary your wheel will drag under you as the fresh air and rapid motion in live in you your wheel will seem to feel a new impulse experience will soon teach you your pace and you will find that taking one run with another you make an average hour rate which will not much vary from day to day you will find it hard particularly if you are of a nervous disposition to conform your own pace to the different pace of another it is like trying to row behind an ore whose style and stroke are different from your own your tastes and feelings may be perfectly congenial and you may be the best of chums off the wheel but if your companion on the road for a long run customarily rides at eight miles while you ride at twelve you both will soon grow as restive as a pair of ill matched horses the result may be to develop a certain petulance of temper rather than indulge which you had better agree to differ and each either take his own pace or separate at the first crossroads at the end of the season if you have ridden prudently and otherwise taken good care of yourself you should be in the best possible condition of health and strength able to take a fifty mile run without appreciable fatigue as your once unaccustomed muscles have developed and hardened by the season's practice in the northern climate you will perforce abandon rotting during the winter and when you mount the wheel for the first ride the next season you will probably be appalled and discouraged to find how much strength you have lost but in a comparatively short time the muscles for a time out of use will regain their former elasticity and power and with a couple of weeks steady riding you will regain all you have lost if you are within reach of a riding school be assured that a regular practice there during the off season say two or three rides each week of half an hour each will not only bring you pleasure in the taking of them but will count greatly to your advantage when you take to the road in the spring end of chapter three