THE PASSION FOR CYCLING.
WHENCE comes the passion for cycling P What makes those who once take to the sport of the " scorching wheel" as passionate in the pursuit of their new pastime as— well, say golfers, for that is to put the thing at its highest, to express the maximum of blind adoration and unquestioning devotion P Is there good ground for this devotion of the cyclist, or is it a mere affeotation,—something not founded on reason and reality, something that will pass and leave not a tyre behind P In a word, is the passion for cycling a mere whim, a fashion of the moment, or is it based on something in human nature which is likely to last P These are all interesting questions, and all well worthy of an answer. Before, however, we attempt to discuss them, it is well to establish our case that the passion for cycling exists; and that it is no exaggeration to say that there are hundreds, nay thousands, of men young and old to whom cycling has become a part of the machinery of existence, and who pursue the sport with fervour and enthusiasm, and not as a mere holiday pastime. An event which took place last week in our opinion amply proves our thesis, That was the relay ride between London and Edinburgh, organised by the Catford Club and the Pall Mall Gazette. The Catford Club, anxious to show what cyclists might be able to do in the way of carrying despatches in time of war and when other means of communication had broken down, asked the War Office to let them take a despatch to Edinburgh and bring back a reply. The War Office was to have no trouble in the matter, but would gain some useful knowledge as to the conditions under which cyclists might be used to carry despatches. The War Office, however, refused to have anything to do with the Club's offer,—what reasons they had for the refusal were not stated,—and so the proposal seemed likely to fall to the ground. The Pall Mall Gazette, however, showed more enter- prise, and it was arranged that a despatch should be carried from their offices in Charing Cross Road to their oorre- spondent in Edinburgh, and an answer sent back. Relays of cyclists, riding in pairs to avoid loss of time by accident, were arranged to be ready at certain fixed points to carry on the letter. If one of the riders had broken down, his comrade would have sped on with the message. Thus two cyclists started from the Pall Mall Gazette offices on the Thursday, and rode as fast as they could to Hatfield. There they found two of their comrades ready to spring to the saddle and take on the despatch to Biggleswade. At Biggleswade yet two others were waiting, with their bicycles in leash, ready on the instant to bear the message on to Alconbui7 Hill. So all through that day, and all through the next night, the despatch passed through England like a fiery cross,—one relay of cyclists handing it on to the next every twenty miles. It had crossed the Border before 9 in the morning of Friday, for it was at Berwick at 8.24, and at Cockburnspath at 9.40. Before 10 it was at Haddington ; at 12.42 it was at Edinburgh. As a cycling performance this was most remarkable, for the weather during the whole ride had been detestable. Not only did the rain descend in torrents, but the roads were through- out in a terrible condition. Worse than all, the riders had constantly to face the cyclist's worst enemy, a head wind. The return journey was as pluckily and as successfully ac- complished as the journey out. Hour after hour, by day and night, the silent wheels sped down the great North Road bearing on the message. All through Friday and Friday night and part of Saturday the relays were still riding on through wind and rain. How the ghosts of the North Road must have rejoiced to see the honours of their abiding place restored ! Think of the men who brought up that road the news that Prince Charlie had come to Holyrood, heading always for Walpole's new house in Whitehall (12 Downing Street) ; of the troopers who not a year later rode with the despatches from Culloden ; or of those, again, who carried north the news of the Battle of Trafalgar,—the news that told Scotland that though his hand was cold upon the tiller, the pilot had weathered the storm. As we have said, the cyclists who took the first relay started from the Pall Mall Gazelle office at 10 on the Thursday morning, and the answer to the despatch, which they bore, reached the office at 2.27 on Saturday. The eight hundred miles had thus been accomplished, in spite of the adverse con- ditions of bad weather and worse roads, in 52 hoars 27 minutes. That is an astonishing performance, all things considered ; for it means that an average of 15i miles an hour had been maintained during the journey. It is safe to say that the same results could not possibly have been obtained with horses, however fleet and hardy. The British mail-coach, whose glories were recorded in epic strain by De Quincey, was for long distances the fastest form of horse-transport. Yet it was far below this record. When the organisation of fast coaching had reached its height, the best record of the stage was 42 hours 23 minutes for half the journey,—i.e., from London to Edinburgh, It would be difficult to estimate what it would have cost to hire riders to take the despatch from London to Edinburgh and back, but certainly a very large sum. But there was no question of hiring. The men who proved what could be done in the way of carrying despatches by road, did it for nothing, and for love of the sport of cycling. Here, then, is sufficient proof of the passion for cycling. The enormous amount of muscular energy expended and trouble undergone in carrying the despatch, was freely given by the cyclists who were willing to do what they did out of love of their favourite pastime.
We cannot enter here into the practical results of the achievement. It must be enough on the present occasion to say that the military authorities will no longer be able to doubt, what no person with any knowledge of cycling ever doubted, that it would be worth while to have cyclist orderlies attached ,to every General's staff. It has been proved to the public that in a country in which there are roads the cyclist is an infinitely better carrier of despatches than an ordinary trooper. What we want to explain here, however, is not the uses to which cycling may be put, but the growth of the passion for cycling,—the passion under which the sport has been developed, and such things as the Edinburgh ride have been made possible. What makes cycling so attractive ? Cycling is attractive because it has in it all the elements of a first-class sport. To begin with, it is one of the most stimulating and exhilarating forms of exercise of which the human body is capable. There is no more delightful and exciting sen- sation than a spin on a good machine on a road in good condition. That, however, is by no means the only attraction of cycling or even the chief attraction. The real charm of cycling for the man of intelligence and sense lies in the fact that the cycle so greatly enlarges his power of seeing men and cities. Dryden praised Cromwell for making Englishmen " free " of the Continent. The cycle makes a man " free " of all the roads of the Kingdom. The man who likes to know the parts adjacent to his home but who can only walk, has at best a radius of ten or say a dozen miles. There are few men who care to walk more than twelve miles there and twelve miles back. The cycle gives at once a radius of from twenty to twenty-five miles; for even an inexperienced rider finds no difficulty in a forty-mile ride. A forty-mile ride is not nearly so tiring as a twenty-mile walk. But think of the difference between being heir to a ten-mile and to a twenty-mile radius. For those who love " to sing the song of the open road," and whose idea of delight is to go somewhere where they have never been before, and to do so by wandering on down one umbrageous avenue of elms or poplars or oaks after another, and not by the heart-chilling process of taking a ticket to a particular place, the cycle has no fellow. The man who sings the song of the open road on horseback, is not really " free " of the wandering borough. He has but a limited franchise ; is but half a citizen. Unless be is a care- less or a hard-hearted man, he is for ever wondering whether his horse is not too tired to go any further, whether the near fore-leg is not puffy, whether the stable at Long Wannington is not dirty and unwholesome, whether the ostler did not for- get the corn or the water. The cyclist, on the other hand, is never worried by thinking whether his horse had not done enough, or too much, already. If he is himself ready to go on, there is nothing to prevent him. As long as the road has a smooth part 2 ft. wide, that is enough. Bad roads are no worry to him if they have only this small strip of good in them, and that they usually have. It is true that the cyclist cannot leap a hedge, but those who are chiefly bent on singing the song of the open road do not want to jump hedges. What they want, is to slide by the farms and the hedgerows, past the village-green, its pond, and white railings, past the old manor-house and its elms, the church and its clipped yew-trees. How superior is the position of the touring cyclist to that of the man on a walking tour. Each carries a knapsack,—the same, but oh, how different ! The walker totters on, the straps continually working on his shoulders, longing, like Christian, to cast down his burden. The cyclist's kit is strapped to the machine, and gives him neither thought nor trouble. The addition to the weight may make the same expenditure of energy produce nine instead of nine and a half miles an hour, but that is all. For all practical purposes the cyclist does not feel the weight of his luggage, and may, with a blithe spirit, give his decision in favour of taking along with him the little edition of " Bacon's Essays," as well as " Murray " and " The Golden Treasury." The pedestrian is the slave of his luggage, unless he will wander like "a salvage man," without even a razor or a clean shirt, content to grow a beard and to buy a new shirt when the departing whiteness of the original one has assumed that aspect tenderly illumed which Dr. Jaeger, with grim humour, calls " the natural colour "—that is, we presume the colour natural to shirts which are worn, but not washed,—the colour that nature bestowed upon the Isabella " Bear," and art, or rather the art of keeping her vow, upon the linen of the heroic Queen of Spain. The cyclist need think of none of these things. If he is in a liberal mood he can toss in an extra this, that, or the other without the miser- able thought, " I shall have to carry all this. I must pant for my second shirt, and lard the ground' for my pocket library." Practically the cyclist does not, as we have said, feel his luggage except in pace. He translates its weight into a slight reduc- tion of speed. He cannot, of course, carry a portmanteau, but he has not to face that dreadful dilemma of discomfort which haunts the pedestrian tourist,—" Which will be most dis- agreeable, to go without the thing, or to drag it about with me P" Happy cyclist ; he can say, " Oh, I daresay I can tie it on somewhere," and not know that this means a dead weight on his back. Assuredly the passion for cycling is fully justified. Cycling is among the most delightful of sports. Besides, it is an emancipation, of that there is no doubt. The cycle does much to level rich and poor. It brings relief to the weary man who asks, " Shall I ever be able to keep a horse to ride ?" and gives him something better than the best of hackneys. No doubt, like other good things, it has its drawbacks and defects ; but these we shall not discuss here. For the moment the " scorcher " and the road-racer and the controversies they create shall not be touched. All we will say is that the passion for cycling is real and is justified.
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