214 LIFE OF TEGETMEIER 



were, of course, my infant daughter and my 

 wife. I wrote : " Dear Father-in-law, — Will you 

 kindly drink Sylvia's health on Christmas Day 

 in a glass of claret, — which I hope you will like, 

 as Sally does. With best wishes," etc. Two 

 days after he returned the note amended to read 

 as follows : " Dear Son-in-law, — Will you kindly 

 drink your Mother-in-law's health on Christmas 

 Day in a glass of champagne, which I hope you 

 will like, as mother does. With best wishes for 

 a Happy Christmas. Yours sincerely, W. B. 

 Tegetmeier." Only four words and the signature 

 altered, yet a very characteristic communication ! 

 Up to an advanced age he hated to be thought 

 physically weak, and indeed he always was 

 remarkably strong in body as well as vigorous 

 in mind. My brother John, who through his 

 becoming acquainted with Egbert Tegetmeier 

 in the old Finch ley Cycling Club days, was the 

 means of the original friendship between our two 

 families, tells me that he gave Tegetmeier lessons 

 in bicycle riding after he was seventy years old, 

 though he did not persevere with that form of 

 locomotion, preferring a tricycle, which he rode 

 up to practically the age of ninety, and on which, 

 as a man of eighty he did some wonderful work, 

 riding out with the Finchley Tricycle Club on 

 many a long run. Sir Walter Gilbey gives me 

 also the following in illustration of the old man's 

 objection to help or sympathy on account of 



