53 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



CORRESPONDENCE. 



THE BICYCLE CONTROVERSY IN STOCK- 

 BRIDGE. 

 Messrs. Editors : 



ALTHOUGH the writer belongs to those 

 inhabitants of the village of Stock- 

 bridge who are editorially stigmatized in 

 the December number of your magazine as 

 destitute of " moral backbone," as " openly 

 immoral," and "barbarians," yet cowards 

 and criminals have their rights at the bar of 

 editorial as of other justice, and he asks you 

 to permit him to file a plea to your indict- 

 ment in other words, to publish this an- 

 swer to your strictures. 



Sound criticism, quite as much as sound 

 philosophy, you will agree, depends on a 

 correct and complete statement of the facts. 

 The following version of the bicycle con- 

 troversy can be maintained by many wit- 

 nesses. The writer asserts it to be in every 

 material part substantially true. 



The professor, whom you justly call dis- 

 tinguished, fresh from a victory in the Cen- 

 tral Park of this city over the ladies, in- 

 valids, and children who had been accus- 

 tomed to be pushed about the skating-rink 

 on the sliding-chairs, which doubtless in- 

 terfered with his essays in skating, and 

 perhaps on abstruser matters, came to his 

 country retreat in Stockbridge naturally 

 confident of equal success in clearing out 

 all bicycles from his path. He was accus- 

 tomed to walk with his eyes downcast, me- 

 dians nescio quid nugarum pliilosophicamm 

 totus in Wis, and the necessity of keep- 

 ing wide awake with his bodily eyes was 

 annoying. There was no Park Commis- 

 sioner and no " Century " or other social 

 club where officials can be button-holed, and 

 petitions granted inter pocuta ; but there 

 were three selectmen, chosen to guard the 

 interests of the town in the old fashioned 

 New England way. He drew a petition, 

 procured eighteen signatures, and presented 

 it to them. Taking it as a fair indication 

 of the sentiment of the town, the selectmen 

 were on the point of granting it, when the 

 application chanced to become known to 

 one or two inhabitants who took a different 

 view. A remonstrance was drawn, based 

 on the facts that accidents more commonly 

 occurred from bicycles frightening horses 

 in the roadway than from permitting them 

 on sidewalks; on the hardship of practi- 

 cally depriving children of all use of the 

 bicycles ; on the impolicy and injustice of 

 subjecting summer fugitives from the cities 

 to the same kind of restrictions they had 

 fled from ; and denying the existence or 



seriousness of the so-called accidents alleged 

 in the petition. This remonstrance was 

 signed by thirty-six persons. The signers 

 were generally heads of families, and up to 

 the moment of this act of turpitude were 

 (with the exception of the present writer) 

 persons of recognized standing and charac- 

 ter. In consequence of this remonstrance, 

 the selectmen decided to ignore the petition. 

 The shrewd professor, then perceiving that 

 though, by dint of that persistent persua- 

 siveness in which he is unexcelled, he might 

 collect signatures, yet that all the names 

 remaining in the town could not outweigh 

 the remonstrance, called on the person who 

 prepared that paper and urged his assent to 

 a second petition, which had already been 

 signed by a considerable number of visitors 

 and residents. This was a remarkable docu- 

 ment. It began by renewing the prayer of 

 the original petition ; but the various sign- 

 ers had been permitted to incorporate in it 

 their different views and prejudices, which 

 gave it so motley an aspect that it was hard 

 to determine what was the net application. 

 It asked in one place that all bicycles be 

 excluded from the sidewalks ; in another, 

 that they be so excluded excepting chil- 

 dren's ; in another, that bicycles exceeding 

 thirty-six inches in diameter be so excluded ; 

 in another, that bells be required to be at- 

 tached to all bicycles ; and, in another, that 

 no bicycle be allowed to go anywhere in the 

 village faster than five miles an hour. The 

 person of whom the request was made, 

 though reiterating his opinion that the real 

 and only serious danger of accidents in the 

 village was from the frightening of horses 

 in the road, yet being fond of peace, some- 

 thing of a " moral coward," and willing to 

 see how a compromise would work, yielded 

 to the professor's strenuous demand, and 

 reluctantly signed a memorandum to the 

 effect that he considered that the chief ob- 

 jection to an order excluding bicycles from 

 the sidewalks would be removed by per- 

 mitting children to ride them there. The 

 multiform document, thus re-enforced, was 

 thereupon taken to the other signers of the 

 remonstrance, who, seeing the memorandum 

 of their representative, signed also. 



The wheels of the opposition being thus 

 scotched, other signatures were then ob- 

 tained, to the number no doubt correctly 

 stated by your informant as a hundred and 

 sixty-eight. Meantime, a moment's cool re- 

 flection out of the range of the professor's 

 battery having convinced the first compro- 

 miser that he had made a mistake, he sent 



