CYCLING ACCIDENTS.
THE papers are very full just now of cycling accidents. Every morning and evening there is a new list of casualties, and if we may believe the St. James's Gazelle, the doctors cannot even enjoy a day's shooting because of the perpetual requisitioning of their services for women and men who have broken everything, from legs to noses. No doubt the summer holidays and the enormous increase in the number of people of both sexes who cycle—and possibly also the paucity of news—have brought cycling injuries of late into special notice, but we very much doubt whether the boom in wheel accidents has any very solid foundation. We do not, of course, deny that a great many accidents have taken place, but we see no reason to believe that the inference which is being drawn—namely, that cycling in general is a. most perilous pastime—will bear investigation. In the first place, it must be borne in mind that the number of men and women who cycle is now enormous. Probably on a fine Saturday afternoon there are not many short of a million men and women riding their machines on the roads of the United Kingdom. Remembering this fact, and remembering also that owing to the interest at present prevailing in the pastime almost every accident which draws blood or breaks a bone is reported, we do not believe that the proportion of accidents to riders is a very large one. Think of what the record of falls would be if the million men, women, and children who now ride bicycles were put on the backs of horses or ponies. Unless we are much mistaken, the accident record would be ten times as heavy.
Still, even making allowance for these facts, we admit that the number of casualties seems curiously large to those who are accustomed to ride with ordinary discretion. The first thought of the reasonable cyclist is one of wonder when be reads the daily column of accidents. ' How on earth do they manage to come to grief so freely ?' is the gist of his thought. He knows that there are certain impreventable accidents, such as a breakage in the frame of the machine or in the sudden appearance round a sharp corner of a timber-waggon and four horses. Again, a cyclist may be ridden into by another cyclist, driven down by a cart which will not keep its own side, or knocked over by an old lady who, without warning, rushes across the road. Lastly, an unseen defect in the road, or a sideslip on a soft piece of sand or on a mass of slimy mud, may cause an accident to the most wary. Still, such accidents are comparatively rare to riders of discretion, and even when they do occur their effects can be largely mitigated by the good sense of the rider. Why, then, are cyclists perpetually hurling themselves against or under cartwheels, losing con- trol of their machines down-bill, riding full tilt into brick walls, colliding with foot-passengers, running over dogs, or courting death and destruction in the various forms recorded daily by the enterprise of the local reporter P We believe that the answer to the enigma is to be found in the fact that most cyclists do not know how to ride. We shall be told, of course, that this is a mistake, and that " most " of the accidents are said to have occurred to experi- enced cyclists. In spite of this, we believe that we are right, and that want of knowing how to ride is the prime cause of accidents. People imagine that because a man can balance and work the pedals he is an experienced cyclist. He is not in reality, any more than a man is an experienced driver who can sit on the box and hold the reins. An experienced cyclist
is a man or woman who knows how to guide as well as to pedal, and to guide something which is going much faster than any carriage usually travels. It is difficult to get a carriage to go much more than eight miles an hour for a distance of, say, twenty miles. A cyclist in a reasonably flat country finds it difficult to go slower. Thus to be a really competent rider the cyclist must have done much more than merely master the art of self-propulsion. He must be able to guide to a nicety a machine which is going at nine or ten miles an hour, and which does not take corners any easier than a light pony trap. An experienced cyclist is one who is aware of all the difficulties of the road, and who knows exactly what ought to be done when an emergency suddenly arises. But such knowledge only comes by use. This fact is, however, very generally ignored. Directly people can balance and pedal they take to the road and try to cut in and out of traffic with the lightest of hearts. The notion that the fact of their never having steered anything going fast before ought to make them careful seldom occurs. They opine that Jones having taken to a bicycle after them, they ought to be able to go anywhere that Jones goes. They never reflect that Jones was, and is, an excellent whip, and accustomed also to ride to hounds. In reality, Jones knew half, and the most difficult half, of his business before he ever bestrode a bicycle. His experiences in riding and driving make him instinctively look out for nasty corners and awkward bits of hill, and have taught him that it is not wise either to rush at full speed down an unknown hill or to cut in between two converging carte. These truths the majority of cyclists are still learning, though they do not know it, and in the process they are breaking a good many bones. On the whole, however, the "butcher's bill" is not a large one. Imagine what it would be if, as we have said above, all the young and half the middle-aged of both sexes suddenly Look to driving dog- carts furiously about the country, and if learner met learner in narrow lanes or on hills like the side of a house. Even the instinct for sell-preservation, often so strongly displayed by a horse in a learner's bands, would not avail to prevent a prodigious number of fractures, simple and compound.
We may expect, then, that the cycling accidents will continue until the present crop of riders have learnt how to ride as well as how to propel their machines. This accomplished, we may hope for quieter times, for the succeeding generations of cyclists will be warned by their elders not to imagine that as soon as they can sit a bicycle they can ride it without risk. Fathers will warn their eons and mothers their daughters not to act as if the art of riding fast, even on country roads. was to be acquired in a single afternoon. What, as the years go on, will tell equally in favour of better riding, will be the fact that so many girls and boys are taking to riding. In a dozen years' time it will be difficult to find any person under twenty-five, and belonging to the income- tax paying class, who did not learn to ride before he or she was grown up. Meantime it may be worth while to make one or two suggestions to those who have not yet mastered the art of riding, and who in bicycling use their arms and legs, but not their heads. "You turn away and your lip is curled. Patience a moment's space !" We are not going to suggest that cyclists should never ride more than seven miles an hour, or keep their brakes always in their hands, or jump off at every piece of down-hill, or take any other pedantic precautions. There is not the slightest reason why people should spoil sport by such enormities of caution. They may ride fast and freely with perfect safety if they will only use their heads and not go blundering blindly on in a fog of foolish self-confidence. Next to having a machine which is in a reasonably sound condition, the main thing for the cyclist to do is to think of the road in front of him. Just as a good driver always watches his horses' ears, the good cyclist should always see that he has got a clear hundred yards of road in front of him. When he has got that he can afford to enjoy himself and not to trouble greatly about himself or his machine. If, however, there is something in front nearer than this, be it either a turning, or a cart, or a cow, or an old woman, or a dog, it behoves him to look out. He must, that is, if it is a corner, not unfix his attention till he has got round it and can see his way clear again, or if it is an obstacle like a. cart or a dog, till he has got by. The mental strain need not be very awful, but there
must be a certain amount of attention exercised till the road is clear again. The same rules apply if the cyclist is going down a steep bill, or if the road is muddy or broken up. In that case he must still ride at attention, even though the road may be clear in front of him. So easy is the act of dismount- ing from a cycle, even when it is going at a fair pace, that if the cyclist remains at attention he can almost always be sore of preventing the more serious consequences of an accident. If he is reasonably alert he can, that is, in the case of a collision, spring off before or at the moment of contact. Doing this will very often save a broken bone. The only accidents which a cyclist cannot, as a rule, minimise by care are, losing control of the machine down a steep hill, sideslip, and a break in some essential part of the machine. Of course a careful cyclist, and one well on the look out, ought not to lose control; but granted that he does, he still may do a good deal to help himself by keeping his head and looking out. For example, if he sees there is a bridge with a brick parapet waiting for him at the bottom of the hill, he can turn himself into the hedge and spring off at the moment the front wheel runs up the bank. To minimise the results of sideslip is, we admit, very difficult, though even here sitting tight and keeping one's head will do a great deal to prevent an actual fall. Still, sometimes a slip is so sudden and so complete that the rider is off his machine before he knows what has happened to him. At the same time it must be remembered that a sideslip of this kind practically never takes place when the rider is saying to himself, This is a nasty, soft, slimy piece of road, and I must look out and keep my wheel straight and not steer erratically.' In reality, the only absolutely unavoidable cycle accidents—except, of course, those caused by drivers who regularly ran cyclists down —are those brought about by the sudden breakage of some essential portion of the machine. But fortunately many of these mechanical accidents simply bring the machine to a stand- still. Of all the accidents that the cycle is heir to, not many bring it at once in ruin to the ground. If the head breaks off short, if the forks snap, if the handle-bar gets loose, if the saddle-pillar has a flaw in it and collapses, the rider if he is going fast will no doubt come to great grief ; but then these accidents are luckily very rare. The commoner mechanical casualties in a bicycle simply act as a very effective brake. Even the snapping of the chain is not likely to imperil life and limb, unless it takes place at the top of or half-way down a steep hill. And even in that case the cyclist's brake ought to enable him to keep command of his machine. As we have said, then, the majority of cycling accidents are due to want of discretion on the part of the riders. When people begin to realise that riding a bicycle, like riding or driving a horse, wants the use of the head as well as of the legs and arms, we shall see the cycle death and injury roll very greatly reduced. If people who cycle would pay as much attention to their safety as people who drive they would find that, on the whole, cycling is a safe pastime. Properly practised it is certainly not more dangerous than driving. In both instances there is, of course, a certain unavoidable element of risk, but then life altogether is a risky form of imprisonment with a capital sentence carried out at the end.
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