Cycles, Motor-vehicles and Tubes 473 



communication ; they have exercised a powerful influence 

 on our general social conditions, and they have become, in a 

 variety of ways, and with different modifications of the bicycle 

 or the tricycle principle, an important auxiliary to the 

 despatch of business. 



Cycling has thus attained to a place of recognised usefulness 

 in the professions, in trade, in country life, in the Post Office 

 and even in the Army. It is no longer a hobby, a craze or 

 exclusively a source of recreation. The cycle has definitely and 

 permanently established its position as one of the most popular 

 of " carriages," and, in doing so, it has itself led to the creation 

 of a very considerable industry. 



By 1895 the demand for cycles had become so great that 

 it was then impossible for the manufacturers to meet all re- 

 quirements. Over-speculation and over-production, accom- 

 panied by severe foreign competition, followed, and for a time 

 the position of the home industry was very unsatisfactory. 

 It has since re-established itself on sounder lines and now 

 constitutes an enterprise of considerable local importance in 

 various parts of the country, including Coventry, Birmingham, 

 Nottingham and Wolverhampton. 



Public prejudice and State policy were factors in the arrested 

 development, in this country, of the application of mechanical 

 power to road vehicles, so that while such application has its 

 ancient history equally with the bicycle, the actual expansion 

 thereof on such lines that it has now become the dominating 

 feature in road transport generally has been brought about 

 in quite recent times. 



When, in the early years of the nineteenth century, general 

 attention was attracted to the possibilities and prospects of 

 using locomotives on the railway in place either of horses or of 

 stationary engines, further projects were mooted for employing 

 steam-propelled vehicles on ordinary roads. Trade expansion 

 and the inefficiency of existing road-transport conditions 

 combined to strengthen these proposals, and from about 

 1827 to 1835 or 1840 much enterprise was shown in the con- 

 struction of steam-carriages, and more especially steam- 

 coaches and steam-omnibuses of which various regular 

 services, in London or in the country, were run with, at first, 

 considerable success. The vehicles in question were designed 

 mainly for the conveyance of passengers, and some of them 



